Syntax not supported by this runspace in Powershell and C#

Question

I am trying to get information about my users' mailboxes using power shell integrated into C#, but i am getting below error:

This syntax is not supported by this run space. This might be because it is no-language mode.

Here is the code that I am using:

using System;
using System.Collections.ObjectModel;
using System.Collections;
using System.Linq;
using System.Text;
using System.Management.Automation;
using System.Management.Automation.Runspaces;
using System.Threading;
using System.Globalization;

namespace Office365
{
    class Program
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            CultureInfo oldCI = Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentCulture;
            Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentCulture = CultureInfo.CreateSpecificCulture("en-US");
            Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentUICulture = new CultureInfo("en-US");

            System.Security.SecureString secureString = new System.Security.SecureString();
            string myPassword = "mySecretPassword";
            foreach (char c in myPassword)
                secureString.AppendChar(c);
            PSCredential credential = new PSCredential("[email protected]", secureString);
            Console.WriteLine("Forbinder....");
            WSManConnectionInfo connectionInfo = new WSManConnectionInfo(new Uri("https://ps.outlook.com/PowerShell-LiveID?PSVersion=2.0"), "http://schemas.microsoft.com/powershell/Microsoft.Exchange", credential);
            connectionInfo.AuthenticationMechanism = AuthenticationMechanism.Basic;
            connectionInfo.SkipCACheck = true;
            connectionInfo.SkipCNCheck = true;

            string cmd2 = @"Get-Mailbox | Select-object Identity, displayname, ProhibitSendReceiveQuota, @{n='size';e={$MBXSTAT=Get-MailboxStatistics $_.Identity; $MBXSTAT.TotalItemSize}}";

            using (Runspace runspace = RunspaceFactory.CreateRunspace(connectionInfo))
            {

                    runspace.Open();

                using (Pipeline pipeline = runspace.CreatePipeline(cmd2))
                {
                    pipeline.Commands.AddScript(cmd2);
                    Collection<PSObject> results = pipeline.Invoke();
                    foreach (PSObject obj in results)
                    {

                        // Do something with each result object
                    }
                }
            }
        }
}

Any Suggestions on this? How can I overcome to this issue?

Answer 1

Normally i like to leave the dead alone but in this case i feel the need to resurrect this old post because i encountered the exact problem, need a place to keep this code and hope this prevents anybody else from wasting too much time.

I have found connecting to O365 with WSManConnectionInfo problematic and after wasting far too much time trying to get it to work i won't be using it unless i have no other choice.

That said the following code works for me and behaves the same as if i had opened a PowerShell prompt entered the commands i want to run :) it makes testing a lot simpler.

using (var _power_shell = PowerShell.Create()) {
  _power_shell.AddScript("Set-ExecutionPolicy -ExecutionPolicy RemoteSigned -Scope Process");
  _power_shell.Invoke();

  var credential = new PSCredential(username, password.ToSecureString());
  _power_shell.Runspace.SessionStateProxy.SetVariable("Credential", credential);

  _power_shell.AddScript("$Session = New-PSSession –ConfigurationName Microsoft.Exchange -ConnectionUri https://ps.outlook.com/powershell -Credential 
  $Credential -Authentication Basic -AllowRedirection");
  _power_shell.AddScript("Import-PSSession $Session");
  _power_shell.Invoke();

  _power_shell.AddScript("Get-Mailbox -RecipientTypeDetails RoomMailbox | Select-Object DisplayName, PrimarySmtpAddress");
  var results = _power_shell.Invoke();

  foreach (var obj in results)
  {
     /* Do something with the results */
  }

  _power_shell.AddScript("Remove-PSSession $Session");
  _power_shell.Invoke();
}

The above code assumes username & password as string variables already in scope. Also an Extention method ToSecureString exists and is in scope.

As far as i understand PowerShell.Creste() provides an execution environment set to Restricted so you first need to change that. In this case becasue we scoped the Set-ExecutionPolicy to the process Admin rights are not required.

From what little i found on the subject it appears you need to remove the session when you are done or you may get throttled and lock yourself out of O365 for some time.