Using Get-Service in PowerShell 7 vs. Windows PowerShell 5.1

Faris Malaeb

Q: How can I get the Username, and StartType for a Windows Service?

A: Quick answer is PowerShell 7.

Microsoft is doing a great job on PowerShell with each version they release. The simple answer to this question is a command called Get-Service. But there is a big update that makes getting the required information much easier with PowerShell 7. I will show the result of this command using both PowerShell 7 and Windows PowerShell 5.1.

Let’s start by typing the simple command Get-Service Workstation. This command return basic details for a service called Workstation. The result is the same for both PowerShell 7 and Windows PowerShell 5.1.

Status   Name               DisplayName
------   ----               -----------
Running  LanmanWorkstation  Workstation

To drill-down and get a more detailed result, we need to see all the associated properties and methods for this service, which can be achieved using the following command.

Getting Windows Services using Get-Service

Get-Service Workstation | Get-Member | Select-Object Name, MemberType

The output returns a list of members that can be invoked in the command line. Here is the output in PowerShell 7.

Name                         MemberType
----                         ----------
Name                      AliasProperty
RequiredServices          AliasProperty
Disposed                          Event
Close                            Method
Continue                         Method
Dispose                          Method
Equals                           Method
ExecuteCommand                   Method
GetHashCode                      Method
GetLifetimeService               Method
GetType                          Method
InitializeLifetimeService        Method
Pause                            Method
Refresh                          Method
Start                            Method
Stop                             Method
WaitForStatus                    Method
BinaryPathName                 Property
CanPauseAndContinue            Property
CanShutdown                    Property
CanStop                        Property
Container                      Property
DelayedAutoStart               Property
DependentServices              Property
Description                    Property
DisplayName                    Property
MachineName                    Property
ServiceHandle                  Property
ServiceName                    Property
ServicesDependedOn             Property
ServiceType                    Property
Site                           Property
StartType                      Property
StartupType                    Property
Status                         Property
UserName                       Property
ToString                   ScriptMethod

Here is the output in Windows PowerShell 5.1.

Name                         MemberType
----                         ----------
Name                      AliasProperty
RequiredServices          AliasProperty
Disposed                          Event
Close                            Method
Continue                         Method
CreateObjRef                     Method
Dispose                          Method
Equals                           Method
ExecuteCommand                   Method
GetHashCode                      Method
GetLifetimeService               Method
GetType                          Method
InitializeLifetimeService        Method
Pause                            Method
Refresh                          Method
Start                            Method
Stop                             Method
WaitForStatus                    Method
CanPauseAndContinue            Property
CanShutdown                    Property
CanStop                        Property
Container                      Property
DependentServices              Property
DisplayName                    Property
MachineName                    Property
ServiceHandle                  Property
ServiceName                    Property
ServicesDependedOn             Property
ServiceType                    Property
Site                           Property
StartType                      Property
Status                         Property
ToString                   ScriptMethod

PowerShell 7

The big difference is in the Property members. Now, in PowerShell 7, it’s possible to read some additional properties that were not available in Windows PowerShell 5.1, such as UserName, BinaryPathName, StartType. So let’s see how to read these properties using PowerShell 7.

PS 7> Get-Service workstation | select  Username,Starttype,BinaryPathName

The output is a clear, with all the required results using a native one-liner command.

UserName                    StartType BinaryPathName
--------                    --------- --------------
NT AUTHORITY\NetworkService Automatic C:\WINDOWS\System32\svchost.exe -k NetworkService -p

Windows Powershell 5.1

For Windows PowerShell 5.1, the operation is not as simple as in PowerShell. We need to use the Get-CimInstance and pass the required WQL query. So, in Windows PowerShell 5.1, run the following command:

WPS 5.1> Get-CimInstance -Query 'select * from Win32_Service where caption like "Workstation"' | select StartName,StartMode,PathName
StartName                   StartMode PathName
---------                   --------- --------
NT AUTHORITY\NetworkService Auto      C:WINDOWS\System32\svchost.exe -k NetworkService -p

In this example, we invoke Get-CimInstance with a query to get the service name and then select the required properties, which is a long way and requires you to know extra information related to the original service name and some basic WMI query language.

Summary

More and more to come with PowerShell 7, ease of use, backward compatibility much rich experience. This post shows a small portion of a small change in PowerShell which will help a lot of admin in their day-to-day tasks.

7 comments

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  • Yeta Edgar Mutelo 0

    Just to add on….
    There’s a difference in the number of property members returned in PowerShell 7 and Windows PowerShell 5.1. You can verify by piping to the Measure-Object cmdlet. For those of you not very much conversant with WQL or CQL syntax, you can as well try to format your code in Windows PowerShell 5.1 this way:

    get-ciminstance -class win32_service -Filter "name='lanmanworkstation'" | select-object -property  startname, pathname, startmode

    Note: WMI has no idea of a service name Workstation. It only knows of a service lanmanworkstation.

    Nice one Faris.

    • @DoctorDNS 0

      One point to make is that each service has both a “name” and a “display name”. The service with the name “LanmanWorkstation” has a display name of “Workstation”. Likewise, the LanmanServer service has a display name of Server. The Get-Service command returns the service name in the ServiceName parameter.

    • Faris Malaeb 0

      Thanks for the comment,
      This is a quick WMI Query that can get the service name via a property named Caption

      Get-WmiObject -Query 'select * from Win32_Service where caption like "Workstation"' | select StartName,StartMode,PathName
      
      Get-WmiObject -Class Win32_Service | where {$_.caption -like "WorkStation"}|  select StartName,StartMode,PathName

      Both are applicable, but there is no need for WMI as the CIM is available

      • Yeta Edgar Mutelo 0

        You can shorten your one-liner by making WMI/CIM do the filtering and omit the Where-Object cmdlet:

        get-ciminstance -ClassName win32_service -Filter "caption='workstation'" |select-object -Property startname, startmode,pathname
  • Vadim Sterkin 0

    You have no backslashes in paths:
    C:WINDOWSSystem32svchost
    Probably, the code block needs to be fixed blog-wide.

    • Sean WheelerMicrosoft employee 0

      Fixed. Thanks for noticing.

  • Alvaro Sanchez 0

    Other big change in cmdlet “get-service” in PowerShell 7 is that it hasn’t “-computer” parameter. If you want to get services remotely you will need invoke-command.

    Invoke-Command -ComputerName ‘machine1’ -ScriptBlock {Get-Service -DisplayName Workstation}

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