1

I’ve started playing around with Power Shell, and decided to start automating as much as I can. So far, I’ve done Windows Updates, AV scanning, and adding/removing users from AD.

They’re all kind of cheap, and already automate themselves, but I didn’t really know where else to start.

Now, I don’t know what to do next. I’m hoping hearing about what other people automate, and what they suggest I do, will give me more to do on the coming Monday.

3 Spice ups
2

Everything! :slight_smile:

Common processes to automate is your onboard and offboarding of users. Automate the entire account creation process, not just AD but any and all other services your users utilize. Automate the notification emails that need to go out, etc… Same for terminations

3

I use Powershell and SQL (oftentimes from powershell) to automate daily reports, daily email reminders, SFTP transfers (with PSFTP) and all sorts of stuff. Just identify things you wish you didn’t have to do or didn’t take as long and try to figure out how to do it with Powershell.

4

How does adding/removing users from AD automate itself. This one I must know. We automate through a payroll report, but if I’m missing something( AD automating itself) I need to know.
Other than that what tasks do you do repetitively that you would like to automate?

5

You should automate any task you do more than a coupe of times. That means both the tribal stuff, and the more complex. So look at the tasks you do frequently.

Yu might also consider creating useful aliases to speed up your use of the console.

6

I agree with tfl on the aliases, definitely speed things up.

On that note I just put all of the commands I use (changing hostname, installing AD/configuring OU’s through to exchange install / upgrade and management) in to a custom toolset that can be automated if needed and each command can be ran through manually if not.

(Changing connector limits in exchange at once in a single command is a time saver!)

7

BHG, we have a template user we clone to make new users. We fill in a few blanks and it is done.

I guess it’s not automated, just really simple.

tfl, I’ll definitely make a few.