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Sabre
Asked: 2014-09-18 09:33:56 +0800 CST

AD Management via powershell on 2008 enterprise

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windows server 2008 enterprise, without hyper-v x64

We have a client server that I am trying to automate some functions on using power shell directly on the server. I have the gateway service installed, and can manage via RSAT from a client machine, but I want to have the cmdlets on the server itself so I may schedule the task to run locally.

Is there any way to actually get the AD powershell tools installed on the server, or will this HAVE to be done from a client machine?

If so, are there any viable reasons to not do this? If not, why is it not possible? (just because it is not supported, or is there a technical barrier I do not understand that prevents it?)

windows-server-2008

3 Answers

  1. You probably want to install the following on your 2008 box:

    .NET Framework 4.0 (Download)

    Windows Management Framework 3.0 (Download)

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  2. You just can't use the AD cmdlets on systems older than Windows 7 or Windows Server 2008 R2; they are not available.

    You can try Quest's (free) set of AD PowerShell cmdlets; they have been quite popular for a while, before Microsoft implemented its own solution.

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  3. Best Answer

    As others have said, the native AD cmdlets module is not available on Windows Server 2008 (non-R2). What I have done in a similar situation is to import a PS session from a domain controller where the AD module is installed, and then use that. For example:

    function Get-ActiveDirectorySession {
    param(
        [string]$Server = '2008R2.domain.controller'
    )
    $session = New-PSSession -ComputerName $Server
    Invoke-Command -Session $session -ScriptBlock {Import-Module ActiveDirectory}
    return $session
}

    Then on the machine where I want to run the AD cmdlets but don't have them installed, I just load the function defined above and run:

    Import-PSSession -Session (Get-ActiveDirectorySession) -Module ActiveDirectory | Out-Null

    This will give you a virtual copy of the AD cmdlets that you can run locally. You can do Get-Help Import-PSSession -Full for more information on how this works.

    I don't know if this method would work remoting into a Windows 7 client machine with the AD cmdlets installed -- I think there might be two-hop issues when actually connecting to a domain controller in that case. I hope this helps.

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