this article<\/A>.<\/P>Function ScheduleJob()\n{\n if($daysOfWeek) { $daysOfWeek = [math]::pow(2,$daysOfWeek -1) }\n<\/PRE>\nWhen a value for the $daysofweek<\/B> variable is present, it means it was supplied on the command line. We use an if<\/B> statement to detect its presence. If we find a value, the script block will be executed. The syntax is exactly the same used for the $daysofweek<\/B> variable. This command is seen here:<\/P>if($daysOfMonth){ $daysOfMonth = [math]::pow(2,$daysOfMonth -1) }\n<\/PRE>\nWe now need to create an instance of the WMI class Win32_scheduledJob<\/B>. To do this we use the WMI class accelerator. We specify the computer name and the WMI namespace. The WMI object that is returned is stored in the variable $sjob<\/B>. This syntax is shown here:<\/P>$sJob = [wmiclass]”\\\\$computer\\root\\cimv2:win32_scheduledjob”\n<\/PRE>\nWe now need to create the date time<\/B> value that is required by the scheduled job<\/B> class. To do this we use the ConvertFromDateTime<\/B> method. The ConvertFromDateTime<\/B> method will accept a string that represents the date and the time that you wish the scheduled job to occur. It will then convert that string into the acceptable format for WMI. This command is shown here:<\/P>if($startTime) { $startTime = $sJob.ConvertFromDateTime($startTime) }\n<\/PRE>\nWe are now going to check to see if a value has been supplied for the starting time of the scheduled job. If no value is present, we\u2019ll print out a message and call the help<\/B> function as seen here:<\/P>if(!$startTime) { “you must supply a time for the job to run” ; help }\n<\/PRE>\nIt is time to call the create<\/B> method of the scheduled job <\/B>class and pass the parameters to it. The first parameter is the command we wish to execute. The command is contained in the $command<\/B> variable. The second parameter is the starting time of the scheduled job; this value contains the converted value that is stored in the $startTime<\/B> value. The third parameter, $repeat<\/B>, tells the command whether or not we wish to repeat the job. The $daysOfWeek<\/B> variable contains the days of the week on which we wish the job to occur. This value only takes effect if the repeat<\/B> flag has been selected. The $daysOfMonth<\/B> value is used to tell the job on which days of the month we wish for it to occur. Once again this value only takes effect if the repeat<\/B> flag has been used. The $interactWithDeskTop<\/B> variable is a Boolean value that tells the job engine whether or not to allow access to the desktop. If this value is not used, a program such as Notepad.exe will not be visible when launched by the scheduled task. WMI will return a value that tells us if the command was successful. The value of zero means there were no errors; any other value would indicate an error during the method call. The method call is seen here:<\/P>$errRTN = $sJob.Create($command,$startTime,$repeat,$daysOfWeek,$daysOfMonth,$interactWithDesktop)\n<\/PRE>\nWe want to evaluate the return code. To do this we look at the return value that is stored in the $errRTN<\/B> variable. If the return code is 0, it means the command completed successfully. This is shown here:<\/P>if($errRTN.returnValue -eq 0)\n {\n “$command successfully created as job $($errRTN.jobID) on $computer”\n } #end if\n<\/PRE>\nOn the other hand, any number other than 0 indicates that an error occurred. We therefore print out a message that the command failed, as well as the error number itself. This is seen here:<\/P>
ELSE\n {\n “Failed to create $command as a scheduled job on $computer. Error $($errRTN.returnvalue”\n }\n} #end ScheduleJob\n<\/PRE>\n <\/P>\n
When the script is run and it is successful, we are presented with the confirmation seen here:<\/P>![\"Image](\"http:\/\/img.microsoft.com\/library\/media\/1033\/technet\/images\/scriptcenter\/qanda\/hsg\/2009\/march\/hey0330\/hsg-03-30-09-02.jpg\")
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One of the things we do not like about the script is the number of command-line parameters that are required to create a scheduled job. There are two things that can be done; the first is to use partial parameters when calling the script. As seen in the following image, the first attempt failed because \u2013c<\/B> is ambiguous. It could mean computer or command. The second attempt works:<\/P>![\"Image](\"http:\/\/img.microsoft.com\/library\/media\/1033\/technet\/images\/scriptcenter\/qanda\/hsg\/2009\/march\/hey0330\/hsg-03-30-09-03.jpg\")
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The second thing that could be done is to add the values for the command line as variables in the script. You would do this just before the entry point to the script. <\/P>
$command = “Notepad”\n$startTime = “3\/30\/2009 11:50 am”\n$interactWithDeskTop = $true\n<\/PRE>\nIn this manner, you would be able to run the script directly without needing to type any information on the command line. The entry point of the script is used to check the command-line parameters. If the script was run with the \u2013help<\/B> parameter, the help <\/B>function will be called and the script will exit. If the script was run and no value was given to the script for the \u2013command<\/B> parameter and the \u2013help<\/B> parameter was not supplied, the script displays a message that states that it is missing a command and it calls the help<\/B> function and then exits. If the \u2013help<\/B> parameter is not supplied and if the command<\/B> parameter was supplied, the scheduled job<\/B> function is called. This is seen here:<\/P>if($help) { help; exit }\nif($command) { ScheduleJob }\nif(!$command) { “Missing command … ” ; help; exit }\n<\/PRE>\nWhen the script has run, you can use the At<\/B> command to see the status of the scheduled jobs. This is seen here:<\/P>![\"Image](\"http:\/\/img.microsoft.com\/library\/media\/1033\/technet\/images\/scriptcenter\/qanda\/hsg\/2009\/march\/hey0330\/hsg-03-30-09-04.jpg\")
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We have come to the end of our discussion of using the legacy task scheduler via Windows PowerShell. As you can see, it is easy to use but is somewhat limited in its options. Join us tomorrow as we continue our series of articles about scheduling tasks. Until tomorrow, peace. <\/P>\n
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Ed Wilson and Craig Liebendorfer, Scripting Guys<\/B><\/P><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Hey, Scripting Guy! I have to be able to create a simple scheduled task via script on a number of computers. I do not need to do anything fancy, but it needs to be quick and easy to do. Do you have any ideas that can help me?– JW Hi JW, The word for the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":595,"featured_media":87096,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[31,32,3,45],"class_list":["post-54083","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-scripting","tag-operating-system","tag-scheduled-tasks","tag-scripting-guy","tag-windows-powershell"],"acf":[],"blog_post_summary":"
Hey, Scripting Guy! I have to be able to create a simple scheduled task via script on a number of computers. I do not need to do anything fancy, but it needs to be quick and easy to do. Do you have any ideas that can help me?– JW Hi JW, The word for the […]<\/p>\n","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54083","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/595"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=54083"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54083\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/87096"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=54083"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=54083"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=54083"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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