CIM/WMI cmdlets in PowerShell - Mini Project: Build & Apply

Using CIM/WMI Cmdlets in PowerShell

📖 Scenario: You are a system administrator who wants to gather information about the computer's operating system using PowerShell. You will use CIM/WMI cmdlets to query system details.

🎯 Goal: Build a PowerShell script that retrieves the operating system's caption and version using CIM/WMI cmdlets and displays the information.

📋 What You'll Learn

Create a variable with the CIM class name for the operating system

Create a variable to store the property names to retrieve

Use Get-CimInstance with the class name to get OS info

Select only the specified properties from the CIM instance

Display the operating system caption and version

💡 Why This Matters

🌍 Real World

System administrators often need to gather system information remotely or locally to manage computers efficiently. CIM/WMI cmdlets provide a powerful way to query this data.

💼 Career

Knowing how to use CIM/WMI cmdlets is essential for IT professionals and system administrators to automate system monitoring and reporting tasks.

1

Set CIM class name variable

Create a variable called $cimClass and set it to the string 'Win32_OperatingSystem'.

PowerShell

# Create a variable called $cimClass and set it to 'Win32_OperatingSystem'
# Your code here

Need a hint?

The CIM class for operating system info is Win32_OperatingSystem.

2

Set properties to retrieve

Create a variable called $properties and set it to an array containing the strings 'Caption' and 'Version'.

PowerShell

$cimClass = 'Win32_OperatingSystem'
# Create a variable called $properties with 'Caption' and 'Version'
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use an array with @('Caption', 'Version') to list the properties.

3

Retrieve OS information using Get-CimInstance

Use Get-CimInstance with the class name stored in $cimClass and store the result in a variable called $osInfo. Then select only the properties in $properties from $osInfo.

PowerShell

$cimClass = 'Win32_OperatingSystem'
$properties = @('Caption', 'Version')
# Use Get-CimInstance with $cimClass and select $properties
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use Get-CimInstance -ClassName $cimClass and pipe to Select-Object -Property $properties.

4

Display the operating system information

Write a Write-Output statement to display the operating system caption and version from $osInfo in the format: Operating System: [Caption], Version: [Version].

PowerShell

$cimClass = 'Win32_OperatingSystem'
$properties = @('Caption', 'Version')
$osInfo = Get-CimInstance -ClassName $cimClass | Select-Object -Property $properties
# Display the OS caption and version
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use Write-Output with string interpolation to show the caption and version.