- Article
You can run commands on one or hundreds of computers with a single PowerShell command. WindowsPowerShell supports remote computing using various technologies, including WMI, RPC, andWS-Management.
PowerShell supports WMI, WS-Management, and SSH remoting. In PowerShell 7 and higher, RPC issupported only on Windows.
For more information about remoting in PowerShell, see the following articles:
- SSH Remoting in PowerShell
- WSMan Remoting in PowerShell
Windows PowerShell remoting without configuration
Many Windows PowerShell cmdlets have the ComputerName parameter that enables you to collect dataand change settings on one or more remote computers. These cmdlets use varying communicationprotocols and work on all Windows operating systems without any special configuration.
These cmdlets include:
- Restart-Computer
- Test-Connection
- Clear-EventLog
- Get-EventLog
- Get-HotFix
- Get-Process
- Get-Service
- Set-Service
- Get-WinEvent
- Get-WmiObject
Typically, cmdlets that support remoting without special configuration have the ComputerNameparameter and don't have the Session parameter. To find these cmdlets in your session, type:
Get-Command | Where-Object { $_.Parameters.Keys -contains "ComputerName" -and $_.Parameters.Keys -notcontains "Session"}
Windows PowerShell remoting
Using the WS-Management protocol, Windows PowerShell remoting lets you run any Windows PowerShellcommand on one or more remote computers. You can establish persistent connections, start interactivesessions, and run scripts on remote computers.
To use Windows PowerShell remoting, the remote computer must be configured for remote management.For more information, including instructions, see About Remote Requirements.
Once you have configured Windows PowerShell remoting, many remoting strategies are available to you.This article lists just a few of them. For more information, see About Remote.
Start an interactive session
To start an interactive session with a single remote computer, use the Enter-PSSession cmdlet.For example, to start an interactive session with the Server01 remote computer, type:
Enter-PSSession Server01
The command prompt changes to display the name of the remote computer. Any commands that you type atthe prompt run on the remote computer and the results are displayed on the local computer.
To end the interactive session, type:
Exit-PSSession
For more information about the Enter-PSSession
and Exit-PSSession
cmdlets, see:
- Enter-PSSession
- Exit-PSSession
Run a Remote Command
To run a command on one or more computers, use the Invoke-Command cmdlet. For example, to runa Get-UICulture command on the Server01 and Server02 remote computers, type:
Invoke-Command -ComputerName Server01, Server02 -ScriptBlock {Get-UICulture}
The output is returned to your computer.
LCID Name DisplayName PSComputerName---- ---- ----------- --------------1033 en-US English (United States) server01.corp.fabrikam.com1033 en-US English (United States) server02.corp.fabrikam.com
Run a Script
To run a script on one or many remote computers, use the FilePath parameter of theInvoke-Command
cmdlet. The script must be on or accessible to your local computer. The results arereturned to your local computer.
For example, the following command runs the DiskCollect.ps1
script on the remote computers,Server01 and Server02.
Invoke-Command -ComputerName Server01, Server02 -FilePath c:\Scripts\DiskCollect.ps1
Establish a Persistent Connection
Use the New-PSSession
cmdlet to create a persistent session on a remote computer. The followingexample creates remote sessions on Server01 and Server02. The session objects are stored in the $s
variable.
$s = New-PSSession -ComputerName Server01, Server02
Now that the sessions are established, you can run any command in them. And because the sessions arepersistent, you can collect data from one command and use it in another command.
For example, the following command runs a Get-HotFix
command in the sessions in the $s
variableand it saves the results in the $h
variable. The $h
variable is created in each of the sessionsin $s
, but it doesn't exist in the local session.
Invoke-Command -Session $s {$h = Get-HotFix}
Now you can use the data in the $h
variable with other commands in the same session. The resultsare displayed on the local computer. For example:
Invoke-Command -Session $s {$h | where {$_.InstalledBy -ne "NT AUTHORITY\SYSTEM"}}
Advanced Remoting
PowerShell includes cmdlets that allow you to:
- Configure and create remote sessions both from the local and remote ends
- Create customized and restricted sessions
- Import commands from a remote session that actually run implicitly on the remote session
- Configure the security of a remote session
PowerShell on Windows includes a WSMan provider. The provider creates a WSMAN:
drive that lets younavigate through a hierarchy of configuration settings on the local computer and remote computers.
For more information about the WSMan provider, see WSMan Provider andAbout WS-Management Cmdlets, or in the Windows PowerShell console, type Get-Help wsman
.
For more information, see:
- PowerShell Remoting FAQ
- Register-PSSessionConfiguration
- Import-PSSession
For help with remoting errors, see about_Remote_Troubleshooting.
See Also
- about_Remote
- about_Remote_Requirements
- about_Remote_Troubleshooting
- about_PSSessions
- about_WS-Management_Cmdlets
- Invoke-Command
- Import-PSSession
- New-PSSession
- Register-PSSessionConfiguration
- WSMan Provider