Incrementing computer names by '1'

PowerShell Help
1

Hi Folks,

Hope you’re all well!

We have a number of virtual machines. Let’s say:

ThickGit_PC1
ThickGit_PC2
ThickGit_PC3
ThickGit_PC4
ThickGit_PC5

A team of us are building them manually. However, I want to be able to script the creation of the new machine by typing (Get-VM ThickGit_PC* | Select Name | Sort Name | Select –Last 1), which will give me the name of the last machine, but how do I increment that by one so I can feed that to the –Name parameter of the New-VM cmdlet?

I know I can use the –ExpandProperty parameter within the ‘Select’ cmdlet to make it a string, but I just don’t know how to automatically go from there to get it to create ‘ThickGit_PC6’.

Any ideas?!

Cheers.

TG

2

Here is an example:

# repalace this with your method to get the last name, don't forget to use -ExpandProperty
$Lastname = 'ThickGit_PC5'

# Check if name ends with one or more digits
if($LastName -match '\d+$')
{
    # Extract the digits in the end of the name and add 1
    $NextNumber = [int]$Matches[0] + 1
}
else
{
    # Name did not end with number, use number 1
    $NextNumber = 1
}

# Create a new name
$NewName = "ThickGit_PC$NextNumber"
3

I think something like this would work:

1..10 | foreach{
    $vmName = "ThickGit_PC{0}" -f $_
    $vm = Get-VM -ComputerName $vmName
    if ($vm) {
        "{0} exists" -f $vmName
    }
    else {
        New-VM -Name $vmName
    }
}
4

As a side note, you are going to run into issues sorting names if that is your naming convention. If you create some mock names:

PS C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0> $vm = 1..10 | foreach{New-Object -TypeName PSObject -Property @{Name = ("ThickGit_PC{0}" -f $_)}}

PS C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0> $vm

Name                                                                                                                                                                                                        
----                                                                                                                                                                                                        
ThickGit_PC1                                                                                                                                                                                                
ThickGit_PC2                                                                                                                                                                                                
ThickGit_PC3                                                                                                                                                                                                
ThickGit_PC4                                                                                                                                                                                                
ThickGit_PC5                                                                                                                                                                                                
ThickGit_PC6                                                                                                                                                                                                
ThickGit_PC7                                                                                                                                                                                                
ThickGit_PC8                                                                                                                                                                                                
ThickGit_PC9                                                                                                                                                                                                
ThickGit_PC10

When you sort these, look what happens:

PS C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0> $vm | Sort-Object Name -Descending

Name                                                                                                                                                                                                        
----                                                                                                                                                                                                        
ThickGit_PC9                                                                                                                                                                                                
ThickGit_PC8                                                                                                                                                                                                
ThickGit_PC7                                                                                                                                                                                                
ThickGit_PC6                                                                                                                                                                                                
ThickGit_PC5                                                                                                                                                                                                
ThickGit_PC4                                                                                                                                                                                                
ThickGit_PC3                                                                                                                                                                                                
ThickGit_PC2                                                                                                                                                                                                
ThickGit_PC10                                                                                                                                                                                               
ThickGit_PC1

We sorted descending and expect 10 to be at the top, but the sort is just seeing it as 1 and zero, not 10. You should consider pre-pending your names with zeros. If your company is going to have 9999 machines max, you would prepend with 3 zeros lke so:

PS C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0> $vm = 1..10 | foreach{$num = $_.ToString("0000");New-Object -TypeName PSObject -Property @{Name = ("ThickGit_PC{0}" -f $num)}}

PS C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0> $vm

Name                                                                                                                                                                                                        
----                                                                                                                                                                                                        
ThickGit_PC0001                                                                                                                                                                                             
ThickGit_PC0002                                                                                                                                                                                             
ThickGit_PC0003                                                                                                                                                                                             
ThickGit_PC0004                                                                                                                                                                                             
ThickGit_PC0005                                                                                                                                                                                             
ThickGit_PC0006                                                                                                                                                                                             
ThickGit_PC0007                                                                                                                                                                                             
ThickGit_PC0008                                                                                                                                                                                             
ThickGit_PC0009                                                                                                                                                                                             
ThickGit_PC0010

Now when we sort, it performs as expected.

PS C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0> $vm | Sort-Object Name -Descending

Name                                                                                                                                                                                                        
----                                                                                                                                                                                                        
ThickGit_PC0010                                                                                                                                                                                             
ThickGit_PC0009                                                                                                                                                                                             
ThickGit_PC0008                                                                                                                                                                                             
ThickGit_PC0007                                                                                                                                                                                             
ThickGit_PC0006                                                                                                                                                                                             
ThickGit_PC0005                                                                                                                                                                                             
ThickGit_PC0004                                                                                                                                                                                             
ThickGit_PC0003                                                                                                                                                                                             
ThickGit_PC0002                                                                                                                                                                                             
ThickGit_PC0001