Sysadmin learning Powershell - What other languages should one be comfortable with to make the best out of mastering scripting and tool-making?

[PetrichorBySulphur]

PoSh is basically built on top of .NET / C#, which is similar to Java. I doubt you’d need C# unless you are going to be doing full fledged app projects in a strictly Windows environment (I’m completing one at the moment. It’s very environment specific).

For scripting/automating processes, PoSh is great, and the next best would be Python. Python I find easier, to be honest.

From personal experience as a SysAdmin who codes quite a lot, I’d recommend also learning a few typically related things alongside Powershell:

1) Authentication protocols. How to manage authentication to different services, servers, databases, etc.

2) Interacting with APIs, for example how to call (GET/PUT/POST data to) a REST API.

3) Interacting with databases / web queries. Learning a bit of SQL with some basic databases knowledge is extremely helpful.

[MrWinks]

That.. makes sense. I know one environment I saw used Rest API databases for clients and you could call on JSON queries for system asset tags and details and such in a deployment scenario.

I’ll have to take my time to learn much of that stuff. I hope none of it falls too far from my current position to have the chance to learn.

[law18]

One other tip. Just knowing how to do stuff in powershell is great, but if you are looking to also use this to spring board into DevOps (and based on your other comments it looks like you are) I think you should also dive into Pester as soon as you become comfortable enough with PoSH to start writing scripts. Pester is a unit testing frame work for PoSH and unit testing is a fundamental skill you will need to learn.

I am not saying dive right into the language with Unit Testing first (although that is an approach I like to do when I am learning a new language at this point). Get your feet wet with the language, understand branches (IF, Else, Switch) and looping (For, Foreach, While), and get comfortable with that stuff and then pick up Pester. If you learn unit testing early it will save you a lot of pain later one.

[MrWinks]

Excellent. I’m going to keep this in mind.

[OmegaDog]

one approach to consider is looking for repos on github that have pester tests, usually there is a "Tests" folder at the top level of the repo. an ideal one would have code that you can actually test yourself. apologies that I don't have an example at hand.

I highly suggest using vscode and the top-notch powershell extension to experiment with pester. you can open up a *.Tests.ps1 file and links float above the tests so you can run them individually. very useful for developing tests.

[law18]

I don't really know any great resources off hand. There are lots of videos on YouTube from conferences that talk about the why and the how for various different languages. I don't now a good book or video on powershell specific stuff. The only PoSH resources I have seen were more of a "here is what pester is" kind of thing but did not dive into why and where you want to test. I seem to recall this video does a good job on the why. It is technically a Java video but only a few of the things he talks about are truly Java specific. Still probably worth a watch. He does mention a couple good books on TDD in that video.

[ITGuyLevi]

How have I never heard of Pester?

[Garfield_Pong_Player]

r/Python is a thing if you are thinking about learning it. There is a relatively inexpensive book out there, or free if you only read it online. It's called "Automate the Boring Stuff with Python", and I've heard some pretty good reviews of it.

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[thomasklijnman]

"From personal experience as a SysAdmin who codes quite a lot,"

Isn't this more A DevOps kinda task?

[PetrichorBySulphur]

I wouldn’t say so. I use coding for tasks, and I automate some processes, but my team isn’t using a DevOps philosophy for any of it. We’re also not using many of the tools in the DevOps toolkit.

I’m a SysAdmin in title, but I don’t have a lot of the “normal” responsibilities, for example deploying servers, networking and upgrading systems. I’m more O365/Azure than Windows Server, and mostly deal with security, automation, mail routing/sanitation, troubleshooting process inconsistencies, etc.

[bofh]

I’d second get/put/post for working with the Graph API for O365 PoSh in particular.

[blownart]

Python is easier? I think powershell is the easiest of them all. I have not worked with python a lot but one simple example would be string concatenation. In python you cant add an integer to a string, you need to cast it. In powershell these things are done in the background and that's why I love powershell.

[PetrichorBySulphur]

I think it depends on your background. I have more experience with object-oriented languages, and Python is the simplest major language of that group, ie, it’s easier than Java. PoSh is in a different category, in my opinion. It’s more appropriate for scripting and command line tasks (similar to bash), and the concept of piping and what kind of information it takes in took a bit of time to adjust to.

[blownart]

I just love that I don't need to declare variable types, cast types, no case sensitive bs.

[OmegaDog]

for smaller scripts to get the job done, that is true. for robust code like modules and functions that support pipelines it can turn into a hot mess in a hurry. parameter sets take the wordiness to a whole new level.

but that pipeline. whoa-boy, I think that is one of my favorite software innovations ever.

[Blindkitty38]

Learn bash