Typically, WMI objects contain properties with valuable information. This line would retrieve all information about all running Notepad instances (make sure you launch Notepad before running this):
Get-WmiObject -Class Win32_Process -Filter 'Name LIKE "%notepad%"'
Likewise, this would use Get-CimInstance to get the same information:
Get-CimInstance -Class Win32_Process -Filter 'Name LIKE "%notepad%"'
Sometimes, WMI objects can also contain methods. The easiest way to find the method names is to use Get-WmiObject, and pipe the results to Get-Member:
PS> Get-WmiObject -Class Win32_Process -Filter 'Name LIKE "%notepad%"' | Get-Member -MemberType *method TypeName: System.Management.ManagementObject#root\cimv2\Win32_Process Name MemberType Definition ---- ---------- ---------- AttachDebugger Method System.Management.ManagementBaseObject AttachDebugger() GetAvailableVirtualSize Method System.Management.ManagementBaseObject GetAvailableVirtualSize() GetOwner Method System.Management.ManagementBaseObject GetOwner() GetOwnerSid Method System.Management.ManagementBaseObject GetOwnerSid() SetPriority Method System.Management.ManagementBaseObject SetPriority(System.Int32 Priority) Terminate Method System.Management.ManagementBaseObject Terminate(System.UInt32 Reason) ConvertFromDateTime ScriptMethod System.Object ConvertFromDateTime(); ConvertToDateTime ScriptMethod System.Object ConvertToDateTime();
To call a method, and for example get the owner of a process, there is a fundamental difference between Get-WmiObject and Get-CimInstance:
When you retrieve objects via Get-WmiObject, the methods are part of the returned objects:
$notepads = Get-WmiObject -Class Win32_Process -Filter 'Name LIKE "%notepad%"' $notepads | ForEach-Object { $notepads.GetOwner() }
Objects returned by Get-CimInstance do not contain WMI methods. To invoke WMI methods, you need to call Invoke-CimMethod:
$notepads = Get-CimInstance -Class Win32_Process -Filter 'Name LIKE "%notepad%"' $notepads | ForEach-Object { Invoke-CimMethod -InputObject $_ -MethodName "GetOwner" }
In the code above, when you remove “GetOwner” and instead press CTRL+SPACE to invoke IntelliSense (or press TAB in a simple PowerShell console), you get full IntelliSense on available method names. If a method requires arguments, use the -Arguments parameter.
