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Added by Jason Helmick March 9, 2012

Once hooked on the command line and PowerShell, it’s hard to leave. Even to grab the mouse to shut down the computer is a nuisance. (Stop-Computer is faster) I’ve started to loath that wired hand contorting contraception and smug little *click*.

As the PowerShell console and command line administration take center stage with the release of Windows 8 server, many admins will find themselves happily administering away their problems one-liner at a time. Unfortunately, for a time anyway, some of the windows configuration tasks like those nasty mouse properties will still be a GUI click to modify.

Speaking of which, how many times do we need to change the Control Panel view? I mean, seriously? I don’t want to side track my own blog post, but its changed in every version. Windows 8 will have yet another “enhanced” view of Control Panel. Yipee.

So, back to my point. There are many times when you need fast access to a quick GUI control panel application. If your heavy into PowerShell, the last thing you want is to stop typing, grab the nasty, smelly, certainly not sanitary mouse and *click* your way through buttons to find Control Panel. How about a new cmdlet to make it a little faster?

I know what some of you are thinking. I could launch Control Panel items from the command line before. Yea, but it was confusing, hard to remember, and you needed to know the weird filename of the application

Control hdwwiz.cpl
Control wuaucpl.cpl
Control inetcpl.cpl

Really? How am I going to remember all these?

The new PowerShell V3 cmdlet Show-ControlPanelItem allows you to launch a Control Panel application by using the name displayed on the window of the app. So, instead of ridiculous file names, you just need to know the menu title name, or part of the name.

So, let’s try a couple of my favorite examples.

Mouse Properties

PS> Show-ControlPanelItem –Name mouse*

Or

Network and Sharing Center

PS> Show-ControlPanelItem –Name Net*
Notice how I’m using the wild-card character * to reduce the amount of typing. Just like any use of a wild-card character, you need to be a little careful with this as multiple applications may have what you're searching for in the name. Here is an example where I got a little carried away.

PS> Show-ControlPanelItem –Name *Net*
This launched both the “Network and Sharing Center” AND “Internet Properties”. Not too terribly bad I guess.

Anyway, here are some of my favorites. I think this is much easier to remember than..
control whateverthatdumbfilenameisagain.cpl

Knowledge is PowerShell,
Jason Helmick
Director of PowerShell Technologies
Interface Technical Training