Update 8/7/2014: We just published the Azure PowerShell DSC Extension, which simplifies the configuration of Azure VMs with PowerShell DSC. Please refer to this blog post for more information At the //build/ conference today, Jeffery Snover demonstrated bringing up an Azure virtual machine and configuring it using DSC and the Custom Script VM...

In September, Microsoft released PowerShell Desired State Configuration (DSC) with twelve built in resources.   Three months later (December), we added eight more resources with Wave One of the DSC Resource Kit.   Two months after that (February), we totaled fourteen additional resources with Wave Two of the DSC Resource Kit.   Can ...

We are delighted to draw attention to this year's PowerShell Summit - an excellent community run PowerShell event. As described by PowerShell.Org: Come meet the Windows PowerShell team, PowerShell MVPs, independent experts, and your peers and colleagues in the PowerShell universe! The PowerShell Summit is a one-of-a-kind annual event, and this year...

Often times, IT Pros want to automate software installation and configuration upon a machine’s initial boot-up. This blog will walk you through how to use Windows PowerShell Desired State Configuration (DSC) to do this. We will show you how to prepare and inject DSC configurations into your bootable media (such as VHDs), so that they are exec...

You are an expert in PowerShell DSC (or maybe not an expert, just someone playing around with configurations in DSC) and have already written fairly large and complex configurations for configuring your environment/data center. Everything is working well and you are a great fan of DSC. There’s only one problem: your work is complicated. Before ...

Let's use DSC to configure something complicated!  In past blogs, we’ve shown you how to use Windows PowerShell Desired State Configuration (DSC) to configure relatively simple systems.  However, the technologies you deal with on a day to day basis can sometimes become complicated.  Don’t worry, DSC can still help simplify configuration.  Let’s u...

Have you ever witnessed a DSC Configuration run where you had no idea about what it might have done behind the scenes? Well, then your worries end here! During any DSC Operation, the DSC engine writes into windows event logs, which are like bread crumbs that the engine leaves along the way during any execution. If you read the blog here about DSC...

Good news everyone! Starting today, you can use Windows PowerShell Desired State Configuration (DSC) to configure Active Directory and SQL Server (including High Availability Groups). We are pleased to release the next wave of the DSC Resource Kit – one that enables you to start using DSC to solve your real world problems and scenarios. When we ...

PowerShell 3.0 lets the user update Help content on a per module basis. In this article, I will explain how you can enable this for your own PowerShell module. Prerequisites: Have a new (script/binary) module, help content for the cmdlets of the module, and a server where the help content is located. For this particular exercise I will be using a...

As you start using Windows PowerShell Desired State Configuration (DSC), you might need to specify credentials for resources. In a previous post we showed you how to define a resource that has a credential property.  In this post, I’ll discuss how to properly encrypt credentials when used in a DSC configuration. Prerequisites First, let us di...