Powershell - Reboot and Continue Script

Question

I'm looking for a way to continue a Powershell script from where it left off after calling a reboot in the script. For example, I am building a DC via Powershell automation, and after renaming the PC to TESTDC01, need to reboot, but after the reboot, continue with the script to go on to dcpromo etc.

Is this possible?

Cheers!

Answer 1

There is a great article on TechNet from the Hey, Scripting Guy series that goes over a situation very similar to what you are describing: Renaming a computer and resuming the script after reboot. The magic is to use the new workflows that are part of version 3:

workflow Rename-And-Reboot {   param ([string]$Name)   Rename-Computer -NewName $Name -Force -Passthru   Restart-Computer -Wait   Do-MoreStuff } 

Once the workflow has been declared (you don't assign it to a variable), you can call it as though it were a regular cmdlet. The real magic is the -Wait parameter on the Restart-Computer cmdlet.

Rename-And-Reboot PowerShellWorkflows 

Source: https://devblogs.microsoft.com/scripting/powershell-workflows-restarting-the-computer/

If PowerShell v3 or later isn't an available choice, you could break your existing script into multiple smaller scripts and have a master script that runs at startup, checks some saved state somewhere (file, registry, etc.), then starts executing a new script to continue on where appropriate. Something like:

$state = Get-MyCoolPersistedState switch ($state) {   "Stage1" { . \Path\To\Stage1.ps1 ; break }   "Stage2" { . \Path\To\Stage2.ps1 ; break }   "Stage3" { . \Path\To\Stage3.ps1 ; break }   default { "Uh, something unexpected happened" } } 

Just be sure to remember to set your state appropriately as you move through your smaller scripts.