Windows Terminal & PowerShell

Windows PowerShell 7 — Object Pipeline Demo

PS C:\Users\Logan> Get-Process | Where-Object {$_.CPU -gt 10} | Sort-Object CPU -Desc | Select-Object Name,CPU,Id

Name CPU Id

---- --- --

chrome 48.23 3421

Key concept: PowerShell pipes .NET objects — not text strings. Sort-Object CPU sorts numerically on the actual CPU property. No awk/grep needed. cmd.exe works on plain text; PowerShell works on structured data.

// Navigation & File System

Set-Location C:\path

alias: cd, sl

Change working directory. Use cd ~ for home. Use cd - to go back.

Get-ChildItem -Path . -Recurse

alias: ls, dir, gci

List directory. -Filter *.log to filter. -Force to show hidden. -Recurse for all subdirs.

New-Item -ItemType Directory logs

alias: mkdir, md

Create directory or file (-ItemType File). Use -Force to suppress errors if already exists.

Copy-Item src -Destination dst\

alias: cp, copy

Copy file or folder. Add -Recurse for directories. -Force to overwrite existing destination.

Remove-Item file.txt -Force

alias: rm, del

Delete file permanently — no Recycle Bin. -Recurse for directories. -WhatIf to preview.

Get-Content file.txt -Tail 20

alias: cat, type, gc

Print file. -Tail N for last N lines. -Wait for live follow (log tailing). -Encoding for encoding control.

// Search & Filter

Select-String -Pattern "error" *.log

alias: sls — grep equivalent

Search text in files. -CaseSensitive for exact match. -Context 2 for surrounding lines. -List for filenames only.

... | Where-Object {$_ -match "x"}

alias: where, ?

Filter pipeline objects. -like for wildcards, -eq for equality, -gt/-lt for numeric comparison.

... | Sort-Object CPU -Descending

alias: sort

Sort pipeline by any property. Numeric when property is numeric — no parsing needed.

... | Measure-Object -Line -Word

wc equivalent

Count lines, words, characters in pipeline content or file data.

// Process & System

Get-Process [name]

alias: gps, ps

List processes. Returns objects with .CPU, .WorkingSet, .Id, .Name properties for pipeline use.

Stop-Process -Id 1234 -Force

alias: kill

Terminate process by PID or -Name. -Force for unresponsive. -WhatIf to preview.

Get-Service | Restart-Service

alias: gsv

List/control Windows services. Start-Service, Stop-Service, Set-Service also available.

Get-NetTCPConnection -State Listen

netstat equivalent

Show listening TCP ports as objects. Filter by LocalPort, State, OwningProcess.

Test-NetConnection host -Port 443

enhanced ping

Test TCP connectivity. Returns TcpTestSucceeded, PingSucceeded, RTT. Replaces telnet for port checks.

Invoke-WebRequest https://api.site.com

alias: iwr, curl, wget

HTTP client. -Method POST -Body -Headers for REST APIs. Returns object with .StatusCode, .Content.

// cmd.exe vs PowerShell Quick Reference

Task	cmd.exe	PowerShell
List files	dir	Get-ChildItem / ls
Change dir	cd path	Set-Location / cd
Print file	type file.txt	Get-Content / cat
Copy	copy src dst	Copy-Item / cp
Delete	del file.txt	Remove-Item / rm
Search text	findstr "x" file	Select-String "x" file
List processes	tasklist	Get-Process
Kill process	taskkill /PID 1234 /F	Stop-Process -Id 1234
Network info	ipconfig /all	Get-NetIPConfiguration
Env variable	%VARNAME%	$env:VARNAME
Clear screen	cls	Clear-Host / cls