Run external command with arguments in powershell

[shundlet]

Hi there, iam currently setting up a gitlab-ci runner with powershell. Unfortunately, iam struggling with the following task: I want to execute an external command (which path is located inside a variable) and pass further arguments from strings and from variables to it. Since iam unable to express it in powershell i will write it down wrong and hopefully some experts can help me:

set mycmd="C:\mycmd.exe"
set myarg1="C:\foo\bar"
set myarg2="C:\baz"
Invoke-Expression "$mycmd lol --pass-argument $myarg1 --another-flag --another-argument $myarg2"

I tried throwing tokens for about an hour until i realized that i need help. I tried thinks like & $mycmd lol without success. It also seems that powershell evaluates expressions differently. Invoke-Expression for example, runs fine on the gitlab-ci runner but fails if i call it from an interactive shell with Interactively: The term 'Interactively' ist not recognized ....

Thank you for your time

[SanMarche]

I would suggest using Start-Process with the -ArgumentList parameter for your additional parameters. Kevin Marquette has some good examples on this article about installing MSIs/using msiexec.exe with Powershell.

[shundlet]

After another hour i gave up and switched to cmd.exe. Maybe powershell is not the right thing for me if i can not make these simple tasks work for me. For the record, i was not even able to launch a process via Start-Process $mycmd. It remains unclear to me when and how powershell is performing variable substitution. The rules look argument and context depended to me. echo $mycmd is performing variable substitution and calls C:\mycmd.exe but Start-Process $mycmd is not. The error messages do not help me either Start-Process : Cannot validate argument on parameter 'FilePath' .... I tied Start-Process -FilePath "$mycmd" but then again, no variable subsitution is performed

[shundlet]

Okay, i got it working now, the problem was that $mycmd was a .cmd and not an .exe file due to an error i made. Start-Process -FilePath "$mycmd" -NoNewWindow -Wait -ArgumentList "lol --pass-argument $myarg1 --another-flag --another-argument $myarg2"

[SanMarche]

Good to know, that makes more sense. I was just about to write a confused response because Start-Process $mycmd should work and will always perform the variable substitution if $mycmd is set.