{"id":12101,"date":"2011-11-13T00:01:00","date_gmt":"2011-11-13T00:01:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.technet.microsoft.com\/heyscriptingguy\/2011\/11\/13\/use-powershell-to-quickly-find-installed-software\/"},"modified":"2011-11-13T00:01:00","modified_gmt":"2011-11-13T00:01:00","slug":"use-powershell-to-quickly-find-installed-software","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/use-powershell-to-quickly-find-installed-software\/","title":{"rendered":"Use PowerShell to Quickly Find Installed Software"},"content":{"rendered":"

Summary:<\/strong> Learn how to use Windows PowerShell to quickly find installed software on local and remote computers.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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Microsoft Scripting Guy Ed Wilson here. Guest Blogger Weekend concludes with Marc Carter. The Scripting Wife and I were lucky enough to attend the first PowerShell User Group meeting in Corpus Christi, Texas. It was way cool, and both Marc and his wife Pam are terrific hosts. Here is what Marc has to say about himself. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

I am currently a senior systems administrator with the Department of the Army. I started in the IT industry in 1996 with DOS and various flavors of *NIX. I was introduced to VBScript in 2000, and scripting became a regular obsession sometime in 2005. In 2008, I made the move to Windows PowerShell and have never looked back. My daily responsibilities keep me involved with Active Directory, supporting Microsoft Exchange, SharePoint, and various ASP.NET<\/a> applications. In 2011, I founded the Corpus Christi PowerShell User Group and try to help bring others up to speed on Windows PowerShell.<\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n

Take it away, Marc!<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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One of the life lessons I have learned over the years working in the IT field as a server administrator is that there are often several different valid responses to a situation. It’s one of the things that makes work interesting. Finding the “best” solution to a problem is one of the goals that I think drives many people who are successful at what they do. Occasionally, the best solution is the path of least resistance.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

This is one things I love most about working with Windows PowerShell (and scripting in general) is that most problems have more than one solution. Sometimes the “right” way to do something comes down to a matter of opinion or preference. However, sometimes the best solution is dictated by the environment or requirements you are working with.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

For instance, let us talk about the task of determining which applications are installed on a system. If you’re familiar with the Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) classes and the wealth of information that can be gathered by utilizing the Get-WmiObject<\/b> cmdlet, an obvious choice might be referencing <\/span>the Win32_product class<\/a>. The Win32_Product<\/b> represents products as they are installed by Windows Installer. It is a prime example of many of the benefits of WMI. It contains several useful methods and a variety of properties. At first glance, Win32_Product<\/b> would appear to be one of those best solutions in the path of least resistance scenario. A simple command to query Win32_Product<\/b> with the associated output is shown in the following image. <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\"Image<\/a><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The benefits of this approach are:<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n