PowerShell Time Saver: Automatic Defaults

Because PowerShell needs to be usable as an immediate scripting language by IT professionals who type in commands at a console, there have to be language devices such as aliases that can make for terseness when appropriate. There are several ways of cutting down the verbiage in a script, and being able to specify default values via $PSDefaultParameterValues is one of the more generally useful ones. Michael Sorens explains how it can save you time in your daily work.

A full and a diff

The default differential

Questions About the Use of PowerShell That you were Too Shy to Ask

Let's forget the actual PowerShell code for a moment: Why is PowerShell important? Why should I use it? Where did it come from? Why did it take so long to arrive? These and many other basic questions are answered in William Brewer's latest addition to the series that answers those seemingly simple questions that you were too shy to ask in public.

Lists With, or Without, Ranges in both T-SQL and PowerShell

Whether you are working in a procedural language like PowerShell or in T-SQL, there is something slightly bothersome about having to deal with parameters that are lists, or worse with ranges amongst the values. In fact, once you have a way of dealing with them, they can be convenient, especially when bridging the gulf between application and the database. Phil Factor shows how to deal with them.

How Do You Return Only User Databases with Get-SqlDatabase

The differential PoSh backup

PowerShell Invoke-SQLCmd outputs DataTables you can INSERT into SQL Server

Aaron Nelson explains how you can take an existing SQL query, run it against a SQL Server and then take the results and save them to a different SQL Server without using Linked Servers.

The default PoSh backup

Backing Up SQL Server Databases is Easier in PowerShell than T-SQL

Learn how easy the new SQLServer module makes backups of SQL Server databases.