How to use powershell.exe with -Command using a scriptblock and parameters

Question

For reasons that should not impact the current question I need to run a script, with the definition and parameters outside the command, inside a different PowerShell instance, without using PSSessions, background jobs or files (I have working examples for PSSession, background jobs and .ps1 files and I'm aware they can replace what I'm trying to do, but I need a working example with powershell.exe -Command as well).

I looked at the help for powershell.exe, and it should support what I am trying to do, but I can't get it working with all that I need (script definition and parameters outside the command).

As a working example I have:

$abc = powershell.exe -WindowStyle Hidden -NonInteractive -Command {Invoke-Command -ScriptBlock {
    param($a1,$a2)
    $a1*6
    $a2*5} -Argumentlist @(8,'abc')}

I need to be able to at least move the -ArgumentList outside the command, like:

$abc = powershell.exe -WindowStyle Hidden -NonInteractive -Command {Invoke-Command -ScriptBlock {
param($a1,$a2)
$a1*6
$a2*5} -Argumentlist @($args[0],$args[1])} -args @(8,'abc')

and even better have:

$script={
param($a1,$a2)
$a1*6
$a2*5}
$args=@(8,'abc')
$abc = powershell.exe -WindowStyle Hidden -NonInteractive -Command $script -args $args

I already looked at the following similar questions, but couldn't find what I needed:

• How to run a Powershell script from the command line and pass a directory as a parameter
• How can I Start-Process powershell.exe with some string splitter?

Answer 1

Not sure if this helps I added a few things to your original script and changed $args to $z and it seemed to work.

$script={
param($a1 =1 ,$a2 = 2)
$a1*6
$a2*5
test-connection -Count 2 www.google.com
Write-Output $a1
Write-Output $a2
}
$z=@(8,'abc')
$abc = powershell.exe -WindowStyle Hidden -NonInteractive -Command $script -args $z 

$abc

48
abcabcabcabcabc

PSComputerName                 : ok
IPV4Address                    :1.1.1.4
IPV6Address                    : 
__GENUS                        : 2
__CLASS                        : Win32_PingStatus
__SUPERCLASS                   : 
__DYNASTY                      : Win32_PingStatus
__RELPATH                      : Win32_PingStatus.Address="www.google.com",BufferSize=32,NoFragmentation=FALSE,RecordRoute=0,ResolveAddressNames=FALSE,SourceRou
                                 te="",SourceRouteType=0,Timeout=4000,TimestampRoute=0,TimeToLive=80,TypeofService=0
__PROPERTY_COUNT               : 24
__DERIVATION                   : {}
__SERVER                       : ok
__NAMESPACE                    : root\cimv2
__PATH                         : \\ok\root\cimv2:Win32_PingStatus.Address="www.google.com",BufferSize=32,NoFragmentation=FALSE,RecordRoute=0,ResolveAddressName
                                 s=FALSE,SourceRoute="",SourceRouteType=0,Timeout=4000,TimestampRoute=0,TimeToLive=80,TypeofService=0
Address                        : www.google.com
BufferSize                     : 32
NoFragmentation                : False
PrimaryAddressResolutionStatus : 0
ProtocolAddress                :1.1.1.4
ProtocolAddressResolved        : 
RecordRoute                    : 0
ReplyInconsistency             : False
ReplySize                      : 32
ResolveAddressNames            : False
ResponseTime                   : 19
ResponseTimeToLive             : 252
RouteRecord                    : 
RouteRecordResolved            : 
SourceRoute                    : 
SourceRouteType                : 0
StatusCode                     : 0
Timeout                        : 4000
TimeStampRecord                : 
TimeStampRecordAddress         : 
TimeStampRecordAddressResolved : 
TimestampRoute                 : 0
TimeToLive                     : 80
TypeofService                  : 0


PSComputerName                 : ok
IPV4Address                    :1.1.1.4
IPV6Address                    : 
__GENUS                        : 2
__CLASS                        : Win32_PingStatus
__SUPERCLASS                   : 
__DYNASTY                      : Win32_PingStatus
__RELPATH                      : Win32_PingStatus.Address="www.google.com",BufferSize=32,NoFragmentation=FALSE,RecordRoute=0,ResolveAddressNames=FALSE,SourceRou
                                 te="",SourceRouteType=0,Timeout=4000,TimestampRoute=0,TimeToLive=80,TypeofService=0
__PROPERTY_COUNT               : 24
__DERIVATION                   : {}
__SERVER                       : ok
__NAMESPACE                    : root\cimv2
__PATH                         : \\ok\root\cimv2:Win32_PingStatus.Address="www.google.com",BufferSize=32,NoFragmentation=FALSE,RecordRoute=0,ResolveAddressName
                                 s=FALSE,SourceRoute="",SourceRouteType=0,Timeout=4000,TimestampRoute=0,TimeToLive=80,TypeofService=0
Address                        : www.google.com
BufferSize                     : 32
NoFragmentation                : False
PrimaryAddressResolutionStatus : 0
ProtocolAddress                :1.1.1.4
ProtocolAddressResolved        : 
RecordRoute                    : 0
ReplyInconsistency             : False
ReplySize                      : 32
ResolveAddressNames            : False
ResponseTime                   : 21
ResponseTimeToLive             : 252
RouteRecord                    : 
RouteRecordResolved            : 
SourceRoute                    : 
SourceRouteType                : 0
StatusCode                     : 0
Timeout                        : 4000
TimeStampRecord                : 
TimeStampRecordAddress         : 
TimeStampRecordAddressResolved : 
TimestampRoute                 : 0
TimeToLive                     : 80
TypeofService                  : 0

8
abc

Answer 2

This answer isn't 100% relevant to the original poster, because they are trying to run PowerShell from within PowerShell. I am trying to run it PowerShell from either a command prompt, or specifically WMI. A little background: the reason I'm trying to do this is because PowerShell remoting is not enabled on my target machine and I want to enable it. I can't use winrm because it requires user input. So, this works:

$x=Get-WmiObject -ComputerName "<computer name>" -Namespace "root\cimv2" -Class "Win32_Process" -List
$x.Create('C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe -Command "& C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe -Command {Enable-PSRemoting}"',$null,$null)

Results:

__GENUS          : 2
__CLASS          : __PARAMETERS
__SUPERCLASS     : 
__DYNASTY        : __PARAMETERS
__RELPATH        : 
__PROPERTY_COUNT : 2
__DERIVATION     : {}
__SERVER         : 
__NAMESPACE      : 
__PATH           : 
ProcessId        : 12508
ReturnValue      : 0
PSComputerName   : 

I should probably post this in a different question, but this one came up on a google search for "how to pass scriptblock to powershell.exe", so I thought it would be useful here.