how to pass a remote variable back into a function

PowerShell Help
1

by willbs at 2013-03-13 11:14:19

i have this code, i check a list of services against a remote UUT
how do i pass $servcount back into the function so i can use it later locally?

function GetUnListedServices ($Serv)
{
$Data = @()
$Script = {param($Servs) if (-not (get-service $Servs -errorAction SilentlyContinue) ) {$servcount = 1; "The Service $Servs IS NOT on the UUT Service List, FAIL!" } }
foreach ($EXV in $Serv) {
$Data += invoke-command -scriptblock $Script -computername $global:uutName -credential $global:Credential -ArgumentList $EXV -OutVariable out | out-file -filepath $global:OutputReportFile -append
}
if ($servcount -eq $null) {"All Services are Present and Match, PASS!" | out-file -filepath $global:OutputReportFile -append}
}
by ArtB0514 at 2013-03-13 12:57:54
Just put it at the end of the function where it will be returned automatically:
function Get-MyUnListedServices ($Serv) {
$Data = @()
$Script = {param($Servs) if (-not (get-service $Servs -errorAction SilentlyContinue) ) {$servcount = 1; "The Service $Servs IS NOT on the UUT Service List, FAIL!" } }
foreach ($EXV in $Serv) {
$Data += invoke-command -scriptblock $Script -computername $global:uutName -credential $global:Credential -ArgumentList $EXV -OutVariable out | out-file -filepath $global:OutputReportFile -append
}
if ($servcount -eq $null) {"All Services are Present and Match, PASS!" | out-file -filepath $global:OutputReportFile -append}
$servCount
}

Then call the function:

"Found $(Get-MyUnlistedServices $ServerList) unlisted services"
by willbs at 2013-03-13 13:09:21
when i run that function, $servcount always comes back null because it is embedded in the remote call
i would like to extract $servcount when the "then" portion of the 1st if-then is run and use it in the second if statement of the function
i don’t need to pass $servcount back to the function call
by ArtB0514 at 2013-03-13 13:16:39
Sorry about that, I didn’t read your script too fully. It looks like you don’t do anything with the $servcount variable anywhere in the remote script, and that the count of the $Data objects will be equal to the sum of the $servcount items. Try it this way:

function Get-MyUnListedServices ($Serv) {
$Data = @()
$Script = {
param($Servs)
if (-not (get-service $Servs -errorAction SilentlyContinue) ) {
"The Service $Servs IS NOT on the UUT Service List, FAIL!"
}
}
foreach ($EXV in $Serv) {
$ThisItem = invoke-command -scriptblock $Script -computername $global:uutName -credential $global:Credential -ArgumentList $EXV
$ThisItem | out-file -filepath $global:OutputReportFile -append
$Data += $ThisItem
}
$servcount = $Data.Count
if ($servcount -eq $null) {"All Services are Present and Match, PASS!" | out-file -filepath $global:OutputReportFile -append}
$servCount
}

"Found $(Get-MyUnlistedServices $ServerList) unlisted services"

I also made a few changes in your call to Invoke-Command. You never used the variable $Out that you created, so I removed it. In addition, I try to avoid pipelines that try to do too many things at once, so I split yours up. Please just take that as an example of my personal preferences. Ignore if it doesn’t work for you.
by willbs at 2013-03-13 15:02:39
great it worked very well,
it was the $servcount = $Data.Count command that i didn’t know about, but figured there was something out there
i modified my code to work with that for practice but i’ll use your code, being a noobe, my code is very bulldozer-ish, and yours is quite elegant looking
also FYI, $servcount is returned as "0" so i had to do the compare to "0" instead of $null
thanks a lot for your help