Today I receive a message from a good friend in Singapore, asking for help on PowerShell. Well, is glad that someone comes to me asking for help on PowerShell. Sorry I could get a little bit excited whenever question on PowerShell. There are many ways to achieve this though, so don’t limit yourself. It is kind of an experimental situation with him on this packet loss detection too. This post is kind of to give you a hint of how you could create your own packet loss detection.

So this is mine but you can modify it,

1. This is a constant IP address value (you can include hostname)

   • Try{
         #Stop progress if failure to achieve a successful return
         Test-Connection <IP address> -ErrorAction Stop
     }
     
     Catch{
         #Return an error message
         $ErrorMessage = $_.Exception.Message
         Write-Host $ErrorMessage
     }

2. You can have it in data entry form too

   • #Data Entry of IP address that you wish to test connection, 
     #if connection successful there will be test conenction result 4 times (by default)
     $IPAddress=Read-Host "IP address"
     
     Try{
         #Stop progress if failure to achieve a successful return
         Test-Connection $IPAddress -ErrorAction Stop
     }
     
     Catch{
         #Return an error message
         $ErrorMessage = $_.Exception.Message
         Write-Host $ErrorMessage
     }

   • Testing how are the result and behavior is. I disconnected from the Internet and an error message return instantly.
   • 
3. For repetitive capability or 24×7, you got to be careful the resource exhaustion. Please check your task manager what is the performance when the PowerShell is running.
4. You can even have it to return to send an email using the Send-MailMessage command, you can use default SMTP or your organization SMTP Server (this is a bit tricky)

   • Send-MailMessage -From 'User01 <user01@fabrikam.com>' -To 'User02 <user02@fabrikam.com>', 'User03 <user03@fabrikam.com>' -Subject 'Sending the Attachment' -Body "Forgot to send the attachment. Sending now." -Attachments .\data.csv -Priority High -DeliveryNotificationOption OnSuccess, OnFailure -SmtpServer 'smtp.fabrikam.com'

Good luck with your testing! 

References:

1. https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powershell/module/microsoft.powershell.utility/send-mailmessage?view=powershell-6

On a Friday night, after my work, I was wondering (finally some self-daydream) is there a way that PowerShell can create application-like. All I needed to get the theory and functionality working, beauty is later.

I texted my buddy in Singapore (.Net Dev) first then Europe (PowerShell master) and asked them, both of them gave me different platform answers but a similar answer was using Windows Form. The surprising thing was PowerShell can do it, I was like “Hmm…a platform the I am familiar with, let’s give that a try.”. Visual Studio also has Windows Form but I prefer to start off the platform that I familiarize first, you know, give myself a base to kick-start. Well, that does not mean that I won’t give Visual Studio a try.
Thanks very much for these 2 Masters!

So this is why I am writing this post, after gathering enough information from these 2 buddies (Masters), I start my journey towards Windows Form. Well, for a beginner is usually start off with “Hello world” statement. I try out the first reference link, this is what I get the outcome;

• A simple pop out of “Hello World with an OK button”
• Behavior: A Message pop up and selecting OK will returning a result

A simple pop up gets me excited to explore more of this Windows Form namespace.

So to gain further understanding, I tried to type something else, I am trying to get a behavior where I click on the “Good Luck!” button then a cute cat or Pikachu meme will pop out, not sure whether it is possible. Oh well, more exploring to do.

#A form with a simple display at the Center of the Screen and a button
Add-Type -AssemblyName System.Windows.Forms
$Form = New-Object System.Windows.Forms.Form
$Form.StartPosition = 'CenterScreen'

#Attributes or Controls for your form
$Form.Text = "Windows Form"
$Label.Text = "Sabrina's first Windows Form"
$GoodluckButton = New-Object System.Windows.Forms.Button
$GoodluckButton.Text = 'Good Luck!'
$GoodluckButton.Location = New-Object System.Drawing.Point(100,120)
$GoodluckButton.DialogResult = [System.Windows.Forms.DialogResult]::OK

#What are the controls to be added into the form
$Form.Controls.Add($Label)
$Form.Controls.Add($GoodluckButton)

#The result
$Form.ShowDialog()

References:

1. https://www.powershellmagazine.com/2015/04/09/pstip-use-windows-forms-to-generate-gui-messagebox/