Get-Clipboard\nSet-Clipboard<\/code><\/pre>\nAnd since we’re all about being lazy, there’s aliases for that: “gcb” and “scb”. On that note, if you want to paste multiple columns into Excel, you want to use the tab delimiter. Don’t do manual labor though, here’s the easy way to get data ready to paste to Excel:<\/p>\n
dir | ConvertTo-Csv -Delimiter \"`t\" | scb<\/code><\/pre>\nThat ConvertTo-Csv<\/code> is way too much text though. Wouldn’t it be nice to make that shorter?<\/p>\nAliases<\/h2>\n
In PowerShell, there is an easy way to be lazy: Aliases. Use their power to abbreviate your commonly used commands. Then put it in your $profile<\/code> so you don’t have to remember to add them.<\/p>\nSet-Alias ctc ConvertTo-Csv<\/code><\/pre>\nAnd now that previous line can be shortened to:<\/p>\n
dir | ctc -d \"`t\" | scb<\/code><\/pre>\nWhere is that “-d” coming from though?<\/p>\n
Short Parameter Names<\/h2>\n
You know all these commandline tools that have a long and a short notation for their parameters? Like where you can either specify “–help” or “-h”?<\/p>\n
Well, PowerShell takes that a step further: You only need to type enough of the parameter name to uniquely identify it.<\/p>\n
Using the example above with ConvertTo-Csv<\/code>, there is only a single parameter that starts with “D”, so that’s enough to specify it.<\/p>\n\nActually, there is a common parameter named “Debug”, but those don’t count here.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
More Tools to improve the Console Experience<\/h2>\n
A lot more tools have been created to help being lazy & comfortable than could possibly all be listed, but here a few more projects out there that can help make console life more comfortable:<\/p>\n
\n\n\n| Tool<\/th>\n | Description<\/th>\n<\/tr>\n<\/thead>\n |
\n\n| AZ.Tools.Predictor<\/a><\/td>\n | Predictive intellisense for the AZ modules<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
\n| TabExpansionPlusPlus<\/a><\/td>\n | Adds tab completion for classic commandline tools such as ROBOCOPY<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
\n| PSUtil<\/a><\/td>\n | Adds keybindings, aliases and other conveniences<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
\n| oh-my-posh<\/a><\/td>\n | Transform your prompt, alternative to the Powerline module shown above<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
\n| posh-git<\/a><\/td>\n | Add git integration to your prompt<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\nPaths, Explorer & PowerShell<\/h2>\nOften enough you want to interact with the file system across applications:<\/p>\n \n- Got the explorer open and want to start PowerShell in that path?<\/li>\n
- Just created an output file and want to open it?<\/li>\n
- Open the explorer in the current path?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
For all of that there are convenient options. From within the shell, Invoke-Item<\/code> or its alias ii<\/code> allow you to open a path in its default application:<\/p>\nii .\\report.csv # Probably Excel\nii . # Current path in Explorer<\/code><\/pre>\nThe other way around works just as convenient. In the Windows Explorer, just type pwsh.exe<\/code> (or powershell.exe<\/code>, if you didn’t upgrade):<\/p>\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/powershell-community\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/69\/2022\/07\/explorer-1.png\") <\/p>\n
Inspecting Output<\/h2>\nWhen you run a command, often enough you get some nice table, that is easy to read, but kind of lacking in data:<\/p>\n ![\"Results](\"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/powershell-community\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/69\/2022\/07\/format-table-1.png\") <\/p>\n
Fortunately, by piping to FL *<\/code>, you get to see everything (even if it is a bit much):<\/p>\n![\"Results](\"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/powershell-community\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/69\/2022\/07\/format-list-1.png\") <\/p>\n
Concluding<\/h2>\n\n“I designed PowerShell to optimize the user, not the code”<\/p>\n -Jeffrey Snover, inventor of the PowerShell<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n PowerShell allows us to optimize the way we work in the console, it is designed to help us automate and make problems go away. So why do I see so many people who don’t apply that same perspective to their own, personal console environment? Go ahead and settle in in your console … or face the charge of being insufficiently lazy!<\/p>\n \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" How to have more control of preferences in functions and the role of modules on inheritance.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":95665,"featured_media":77,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[73,3,63,74],"class_list":["post-716","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-powershell","tag-convenience","tag-powershell","tag-preference-variables","tag-tab-expansion"],"acf":[],"blog_post_summary":" How to have more control of preferences in functions and the role of modules on inheritance.<\/p>\n","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/powershell-community\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/716","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/powershell-community\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/powershell-community\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/powershell-community\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/95665"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/powershell-community\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=716"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/powershell-community\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/716\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/powershell-community\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/77"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/powershell-community\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=716"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/powershell-community\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=716"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/powershell-community\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=716"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
|
![\"Console](\"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/powershell-community\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/69\/2022\/07\/tab-completion-1.png\")
<\/p>\n![\"A](\"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/powershell-community\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/69\/2022\/07\/prompt-1.png\")
<\/p>\n