A while back I restructured my website so that this blog no longer started at the root, instead starting from /blog. This was so that I could introduce some other web apps and have a subfolder for projects etc.

One of the pains of this restructure was modifying all the links - I thought I had caught all this with a Redirector HttpModule, but recently realised that for some reason I had not caught images embedded in the posts themselves.
Also it was becoming a pain having to remember to include the HttpModule in my web.config everytime I upgraded my blog (dasBlog)

I wanted it fixed properly this time, so grabbed a copy of all the XML files in my 'content' folder, copied them to a local folder and cracked open PowerShell...

I wanted every instance of www.mywebsite.com changed to www.mywebsite.com/blog - not difficult, but this would also change valid urls such as www.mywebsite.com/blog/page.aspx to www.mywebsite.com/blog/blog/page.aspx (note the /blog/blog in the url)

So I got everything I needed done with two 'one liners' in PowerShell...

dir | %{ $a = get-content $_ ; $a = $a -replace ("www.mywebsite.com", "www.mywebsite.com/blog") ; set-content $_ $a }

...and...

dir | %{ $a = get-content $_ ; $a = $a -replace ("www.mywebsite.com/blog/blog", "www.mywebsite.com/blog") ; set-content $_ $a }

All fixed...

I have been playing with Twitter recently and thought it might be neat to see if I could post a 'tweet' from PowerShell. There is a great Google Group that discusses their API. The APIs are all REST based and really easy to use - the only complexity is that you need HTTP Basic Authentication to do anything 'real'.

One of the more simple API calls is to get the public timeline. No authentication is required for this so you can simply the url into your browser and get back the data (xml format, but json and other formats are available also). Try this :

http://twitter.com/statuses/public_timeline.xml

Now, for doing an update we need the following API:

update Updates the authenticating user's status.  Requires the status parameter specified below.  Request must be a POST. URL: http://twitter.com/statuses/update.format Formats: xml, json.  Returns the posted status in requested format when successful. Parameters: status.  Required.  The text of your status update.  Be sure to URL encode as necessary.  Must not be more than 160 characters and should not be more than 140 characters to ensure optimal display.

The fact it must be a POST means we have to use a HttpWebRequest (as opposed to the easier WebClient). Anyway, here is the PowerShell function :

function Send-Tweet([string]$text, [string]$username, [string]$password) {      $updateurl = "http://twitter.com/statuses/update.xml"      $result = $null      $text = [System.Web.HttpUtility]::UrlEncode($text)        [System.Net.HttpWebRequest] $request = [System.Net.HttpWebRequest] [System.Net.WebRequest]::Create($updateurl)      $request.Credentials = new-object System.Net.NetworkCredential($username, $password)      $request.Method = "POST"      $request.ContentType = "application/x-www-form-urlencoded"      $param = "status=" + $text      $sourceParam = "&source=PowerShell"      $request.ContentLength = $param.Length + $sourceParam.Length        [System.IO.StreamWriter] $stOut = new-object System.IO.StreamWriter($request.GetRequestStream(), [System.Text.Encoding]::ASCII)      $stOut.Write($param)      $stOut.Write($sourceParam)      $stOut.Close()        [System.Net.HttpWebResponse] $response = [System.Net.HttpWebResponse] $request.GetResponse()      if ($response.StatusCode -ne 200)      {            $result = "Error : " + $response.StatusCode + " : " + $response.StatusDescription      }      else      {            $sr = New-Object System.IO.StreamReader($response.GetResponseStream())            [xml]$xml = [xml]$sr.ReadToEnd()            $id = $xml.status.id            $tweet = $xml.status.text            if ($tweet.length -gt 50) { $tweet = $tweet.Substring(0,50) + "...(truncacted)" }            $result = "Tweet " + $id + " added : " + $tweet      }           return $result }

And to use it :

send-tweet "I'm sending updates from PowerShell, cool or what ??" "<your_username>" "<your_password>"

It's time to flex those scripting fingers and get your brain warmed up - The 2008 Scripting Games are coming.

Put a note in your calendars - February 15-March 3, 2008.

Stay tuned to the Scripting Games Tips for some (possible) hints and useful techniques that the tasks may involve...

One of my colleagues switched me on to PowerShell Plus and I'm loving it.

Code editor, snippets, values of variables, logging tools and much more, including a really neat feature called 'MiniMode' (see the toolbar icon at the extreme right in the image.

This 'MiniMode' closes all toolbars/toolwindows except the main console but also makes the console window transparent (user configurable level of transparency). This mode is real easy to work with...

There is a free single user license for non commercial use.

I encourage you to try it out.

PowerShell has been around for some time now, what with betas and CTPs. For (the released version of) Vista it became available a month or so ago.

It's been on my 'must get to grips with' list for a while now and I've kinda been following some blogs about it, slowly getting a little knowledge here and there.

Mr Hanselman (the oracle for all things technical) has done a couple of podcasts on it and I listened a couple of weeks ago to an episode of Hanselminutes where he interviewed Bruce Payette. Bruce is the language architect for PowerShell and has just (2 weeks ago) released a book on it (Windows PowerShell in Action).

Bought the book last week in the US and have had it open ever since. Everything I do, I now do with a rosy PowerShell perspective. The only way (I find) to really to get to grips with something is to completely immerse yourself in it - think in it, live it, breathe it....

Today I have been updating the server side file for our Archive One (email archiving for Exchange) auto update feature (we're just released V5.0 SR1, so the build numbers that are checked have changed). It's a simple XML file that is parsed for 'GA' release version (ProdVer) and 'HF' version (hotfix). It looks like this (sample only):

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<Versions>
    <AOnePolService ProdVer="5.0.0.1643" HotFix="5.0.0.1643"></AOnePolService>
    <AOneCmplService ProdVer="4.3.0.1077" Hotfix="4.3.0.1094"></AOneCmplService>
</Versions>

I wanted to provide a quick and easy way to find the latest version of each products. I came up with the following PowerShell one liner (split over three lines for readability):

([XML] (new-object ("net.webclient")).Downloadstring(
"http://support.c2c.com/versioncheck/currentversions.xml")).versions.get_ChildNodes() | 
% { "" } { $_.psbase.Name + "`t GA=" + $_.prodver + "`t HF=" + $_.hotfix } { "" }

Downloads the xml file, parses it and lists out the product, GA version and HF version

Watch this space for some Active Directory related stuff as I have been very active in scripting AD over the past few days and am in the process of porting it to PowerShell.