Chapter 1. An Introduction to Essential Administration with PowerCLI

It's 4 pm on a Friday afternoon; you are packing up for a weekend camping trip with the family when your boss walks up to your desk with that I have an immediate task that I need to hand off before I leave for the weekend look on his face. You say, "Hey sir, I am just heading out camping this weekend and I need to beat the traffic, gotta go!" But you are just not that lucky, he quickly replies that his boss has an important meeting and needs some numbers before a Monday morning meeting, and adds, "I don't have the skills in the infrastructure to get this information and I am desperate to get this tonight. Besides, we will all look like heroes if we do this." "Or at least you will", you mutter under your breath.

Is that a normal scenario in your office? It was my role for a number of clients over the last few years until I started predicting the future and writing PowerCLI scripts. This book is a collection of administration experiences for managing a virtual infrastructure and for incorporating the vast skill of DevOps and scripting.

This chapter deals with the getting started mentality, experiencing taking the System Administrator role to the next level, and making the endless job of system operations a bite-sized effort.

In this chapter, you will learn about:

• PowerShell versions
• PowerCLI versions
• Getting PowerShell and PowerCLI
• Setting up the environment
• PowerShell basics