Yesterday, Microsoft announced that they are open sourcing PowerShell, their powerful, task-based command-line shell and scripting language, and bringing it to Linux. This move is part of Microsoft’s larger efforts to orient more of their offerings to be customer-centric, maximizing the utility of Microsoft tools by making them support a wider range of functionality across a larger number of devices, and is part of a larger trend in open sourcing software.
This move will see a number of small updates to PowerShell, but Microsoft is emphasizing two major ones: the new PowerShell Editor Service and an extension of the PowerShell Remoting Protocol (MS-PSRP). The editor service will grant users their choice of a range of editors, beginning with VS Code and Sublime, while the MS-PSRP extension will give users the option to use SSH or WINRM as a transport. These changes to PowerShell also increase what you can do with Microsoft’s Operations Management Suite, providing visibility and control across Azure and other clouds.
For those who are already familiar with PowerShell, these updates are an exciting new opportunity to expand what PowerShell can do. If you aren’t familiar with PowerShell, there’s no better time to start learning. Microsoft’s Learning PowerShell GitHub repository provides a wealth of resources for developers, but for those looking for a more guided experience, Rui Machado’s PowerShell Succinctly, part of Syncfusion’s Succinctly series, is a great way to gain experience with the product.
For those of you who use PowerShell, what are your thoughts? Is this the dawn of a new age of PowerShell, or is there more that you’d like to see in future updates? Let us know in the comments below or on Facebook or Twitter .