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Use the powershell Chef InSpec audit resource to test a Powershell script on the Windows platform.

Availability

Installation

This resource is distributed along with Chef InSpec itself. You can use it automatically.

Version

This resource first became available in v1.0.0 of InSpec.

Syntax

A powershell resource block declares a Powershell script to be tested, and then compares the output of that command to the matcher in the test:

script = <<-EOH
  # a PowerShell script
EOH

describe powershell(script) do
  its('property') { should eq 'output' }
end

where

• 'script' must specify a Powershell script to be run
• 'matcher' is one of exit_status, stderr, or stdout
• 'output' tests the output of the command run on the system versus the output value stated in the test

Properties

exit_status

The exit_status property tests the exit status for the command:

its('exit_status') { should eq 123 }

stderr

The stderr property tests results of the command as returned in standard error (stderr):

its('stderr') { should eq 'error' }

stdout

The stdout property tests results of the command as returned in standard output (stdout):

its('stdout') { should eq '/^1$/' }

Examples

The following examples show how to use this Chef InSpec audit resource.

Get all groups of Administrator user

script = <<-EOH
  # find user
  $user = Get-WmiObject Win32_UserAccount -filter "Name = 'Administrator'"
  # get related groups
  $groups = $user.GetRelated('Win32_Group') | Select-Object -Property Caption, Domain, Name, LocalAccount, SID, SIDType, Status
  $groups | ConvertTo-Json
EOH

describe powershell(script) do
  its('stdout') { should_not eq '' }
end

Write-Output ‘hello’

The following Powershell script:

script = <<-EOH
  Write-Output 'hello'
EOH

can be tested in the following ways.

For a newline:

describe powershell(script) do
  its('stdout') { should eq "hello\r\n" }
  its('stderr') { should eq '' }
end

Removing whitespace \r\n from stdout:

describe powershell(script) do
  its('strip') { should eq "hello" }
end

No newline:

describe powershell("'hello' | Write-Host -NoNewLine") do
  its('stdout') { should eq 'hello' }
  its('stderr') { should eq '' }
end

Matchers

For a full list of available matchers, please visit our matchers page.