Scheduled site downtime

Windows Azure has advised us of scheduled downtime on Friday, December 6, from approximately 15:00 hours (US Pacific) until approximately midnight Pacific time.

Login now required for comments

A quick note and an apology: I’ve had to modify the site configuration to require users to be registered and logged in before they can comment. We’ve been taking a ridiculous amount of comment spam, and it’s consuming more and more time to weed through it.
You can register using any major social media account, so you don’t have to remember yet another username and password with us, so hopefully that’ll mitigate the inconvenience.
Have a great week!

Seeking Coaches and Judges for the Winter Scripting Games

We’re now seeking volunteer Coaches and Judges for the Winter Scripting Games!
The Games are tentatively scheduled to run for 4-6 weeks starting January 6th, 2014. There will be 4-6 events, each lasting one week.

Coaches

Coaches have access to all teams’ entries and private discussion threads for the week while entries are being developed and accepted. Coaches are meant to log in throughout that one-week period, evaluate what teams have submitted so far, and offer comments and advice in the in-Game discussion thread.

Coaches’ comments receive a special flag, helping teams focus on them quickly. Note that teams are not required to use the in-Game discussion thread - they can discuss via email or elsewhere. Teams are also not required to continually submit entry files for coach review, so for some teams, coaches will have nothing to offer.
Team discussions are private to the team members and coaches; discussions will not be made public.
We’ll accept as many coaches as want to participate. Note that you cannot be both a coach and a judge, and coaches are not permitted to participate on a team as a player.

The New Look of the Scripting Games

I’ve been busily working on a new interface for the Scripting Games - we’re still planning a Winter Games event - and wanted to share progress. You can click this thumbnail to see the full image.

The new Scripting Games features movable, resizable panes

The new layout features movable, resizable panels, allowing you to position them however works best on your screen. No, they’re not especially mobile-friendly.
As you can see (at least in implication), entries can consist of multiple files, as in a complex script module. There’s a team-level discussion as well as (as shown) discussion threads for each file. Any player on the team can add new files, delete files, or modify existing files by uploading a replacement. This view shows that I joined the team “Aliens” after the current event had started, which is why I’m unable to contribute new files.
Your team won’t be restricted to using the Scripting Games Web site. In fact, you can collaborate and communicate however you like. Use Git or PoshCode for your scripts, and e-mail or a discussion list for communications. It’s your choice.
We’ll be recruiting a team of Coaches, who will browse whatever you’ve added to the Scripting Games Web site in advance of the event deadline, offering their own comments - you can see that Coach comments are highlighted for easy recognition. It’ll pay to drop code into the Web site every day so our coaches have something to comment upon, and to check in daily for any coach comments that may have been left.
The upcoming Games events will be more complicated - you’ve got a team to work with, so we figure you can handle an extra challenge. Event scenarios will be authored by a team of community all-star volunteers, including The Scripting Guys and various MVPs and enthusiasts. That should give each scenario a slightly different flavor, exposing you to a wider variety of real-world challenges.
Judging of team entries will involve a more complex scoring rubric than our past 1-to-5-stars technique - giving you a more detailed scorecard. Keep in mind that each team will be able to submit only one combined entry, which will give our judges fewer to look at - and more time to look at each one. The new rubric will still allow judges to express some personal tastes and opinions, so you shouldn’t expect to be able to please everyone every time!
Team assembly will allow you to form your own team, or be automatically assigned to a team that needs players (teams MUST have 2 players to participate). We’ve rigged the system to ask for your time zone, and to display the average time zone offset of potential teams. That way, you can look for a team whose players are geographically close to you, helping to facilitate any real-time collaboration you might set up (via YouTube, Google+, or whatever). If you choose auto-assignment, the system looks for a team whose players are geographically close to you, relatively speaking.
Local user groups are encouraged to form their own team, and to have their own members join - that way, the Scripting Games can be the topic of a monthly meeting or two.
Things are still evolving and under development, but wanted to share this early look!

Seeking Curators for PowerShell eBooks

[UPDATE: I think I’ve finally gotten all the books under curation - but if you’ve an idea for a PowerShell-related ebook, and would like to co-author or even be a principal author (I’ll help out with logistics), still hit me up.]
As you may know, PowerShell.org hosts a number of free ebooks that have, to date, been written mainly by me. But I’ve recently been delighted to welcome some co-contributors - Forums regular Dave Wyatt has contributed new content to “Secrets of PowerShell Remoting,” for example, and Matt Penny has volunteered to organize the forthcoming “Community Book of PowerShell Practices.”
I’d like to try and sign up “curators” for some of our other free ebooks, including the forthcoming “Big Book of PowerShell Error Handling” and the “Creating Trend and Analysis Reports in PowerShell” titles, as well as - and this is one I’m really interested in getting someone for - the “Big Book of PowerShell Gotchas.”
What’s a curator do?
Mainly, incorporate community feedback (typos, etc) into future editions, as well as integrating new content. That content might be written by the curator, or contributed by someone else. We use a very simple Word template, and you’d use Calibre to produce PDF and EPUB from that. I provide cover art images and whatnot - this is mainly an “assemble, organize, and deal with the errata” process at a minimum. If you are passionate about the topic, you can of course become a co-author with me and add your own content (and I’m happy to help you do so). That’s especially true for the “Gotchas” title, which is mainly a series of short articles that cover some of the shell’s biggest speed bumps.
A copy of Word, Calibre (free) and a GitHub client (free) are needed, plus a few free hours every few months and the willingness to take on the job. You’ll truly be helping: I often can produce extra content now and again, but actually spell-checking it, putting it into the book, making the EPUB version, and so on - believe it or not, that stuff takes me more time and is one reason the ebooks don’t get updated more often. Sigh.
Hit me up if you’re interested in helping out!

Nominate Your PowerShell Hero

PowerShell.org is proud to announce a new community recognition program: PowerShell Heroes. We’re looking for your Hero nominations!
A PowerShell Hero is someone who you feel does an outstanding job helping the community, perhaps by answering questions in forums (here or elsewhere), writing useful blog posts, offering education, and more. A PowerShell Hero is someone who  has not already received formal recognition elsewhere , meaning past and present MVPs are not eligible. _
_
We are accepting nominations until December 15th, 2013. At that point, the Board of PowerShell.org will review the nominations, and in early 2014 we will announce those we’re honoring with this recognition. In subsequent years, past honorees will decide who gets recognized in the following years.
Who can I nominate? Anyone you want, except current or past MVPs, Microsoft employees, Microsoft Regional Directors, or others who have been formally recognized for their community contributions.
**How do I nominate them? **Send us an e-mail (admin@; our domain is powershell.org). We need the person’s name or online handle, and some links to their contributions. Also describe in 100-500 words why they’re your PowerShell Hero. Please put “PowerShell Hero” in the subject line of your email.
How many people will be recognized? We don’t have a fixed number.
**What will honorees receive? **Online recognition; we’ll be publishing an online directory of Heroes. We’re looking into making plaques, but it depends a bit on the finances. There are no other benefits to the honoree.
**Must someone re-qualify every year? **This isn’t like the MVP program - it’s a recognition with no benefits. So there’s nothing to “qualify” for. In future years, the previous year’s honorees will select the next year’s honorees, so you’re prohibited from being recognized in sequential years.
**How can I think of who to nominate? **Think about who has helped you with PowerShell problems. Did someone help you solve something through a discussion forum? Did someone’s blog post give you that “aha!” moment? Did someone spend a massive amount of time putting together a PowerShell event that really helped you? Those are the heroes we want to recognize. Again, past and present MVP award recipients are not eligible - they’ve already been recognized.
We look forward to your nominations!

Site Maintenance this Weekend (Aug 17-18 2013)

This weekend, we’ll be conducting maintenance on PowerShell.org. We have several goals:
**New visual theme. **We’ll be installing a new visual theme. While we hope to catch everything, you may run across something goofy-looking. Please use the Community Discussion forum to report that, so we can ask the designers to take a look.
**Performance. We’re going to continue to work on performance, with a goal of getting specified pages to have an “A” on the Page Test and YSlow tests. That’s not the entirety of performance, but it’s what we can address now without moving to a different hosting environment (which is planned). During this phase of our maintenance, the site may not function correctly, or certain features may come and go as we test different configurations.
Cleanup. **We’ll be condensing certain features of the site, rearranging menus, and so on, to provide a better visual experience across a wider variety of devices.
We appreciate your patience!

State of the Org: Website, Games, Summit, and More

I wanted to share a quick update on PowerShell.org, Inc.
First, a couple of Web designer friends of mine have volunteered to do a visual re-theme of the site. Below is some of their early work, and you’re welcome to comment; I’ll just remind you that they’re volunteers and doing this _as a favor. _So be nice! You’ll notice that one of these reflects the layout a smartphone would use, which trims much of the “chrome” in favor of the content. They haven’t tackled the forums yet - that’s harder, and will probably come last.

Need Desired State Configuration Modules?

You’ve probably been hearing about Desired State Configuration from a number of sources (Runas Radio, the PowerScripting Podcast, or the Channel 9 TechEd video for example).  If you haven’t go check out those previously mentioned resources, I’ll wait…
Ok, now that you have a basic understanding of what Desired State Configuration (DSC) is, I have an announcement.

PowerShell.Org is building a repository of DSC modules for the community to use and contribute to.

As I’ve started working with Desired State Configuration, I began building up a repository of modules I would use in configuring my systems.  I started to round them out with some basic documentation and decent logging messages and began pushing them to GitHub.
I’ve also seen several others starting to post some DSC modules on Github and elsewhere.  Since we are very early in the Desired State Configuration lifecycle (it’s still not RTM yet), I would like our community to come together on a central location for our community contributions.  I reached out to Don and the PowerShell.Org team and they graciously offered to host the contributions on the PowerShell.Org GitHub repository.  What that means is that this effort is no longer under the control of one person (me), but owned by the community, by PowerShell.Org.
There’s not much in the repository yet, so if you’ve been experimenting with DSC and would like to share your efforts with the community, feel free to send a pull request (if you’re into the whole GitHub thing) or file an issue on the GitHub site and we’ll figure something out.
There is some basic “Getting Started With Developing DSC Modules” information at the GitHub repository as well.

A Quick #PowerShell #PSHSummit Update (Europe & NA)

PowerShell Summit North America 2014, April 28-30 (special precon on April 27) is open for registration to our 2013 alumni, shareholders, and to TechLetter subscribers. The alumni block will be released on August 15, and the subscriber block on September 15th; shortly after, sales will be open to the public. If you’re a shareholder, alumni, or subscriber, and you didn’t get your registration in e-mail, drop me a line (use the Contact link in the Site Info menu). Please only contact me if you’re anxious to register right now, so I don’t get swamped.
North America will be in Bellevue, WA, adjacent to Microsoft offices up there; we will investigate a move East for the 2015 show, just to perhaps spread the love a bit. We know SEA isn’t the cheapest travel destination.
North America’s call for topics should start fairly soon, and that information will be posted here, along with information on how to submit prospective sessions. I won’t be taking the lead on that process, but some of my fellow Board members will be, so watch for their posts.
PowerShell Summit Europe 2014 is being tentatively scheduled for September or October 2014. Our city shortlist includes Munich, Milan, and Amsterdam; we’re too far out at this point to make inquiries with prospective venues (they usually work only 8-12 months out), but we’ve assembled a list to contact over the next couple of months. Venue pricing and availability (and suitability) will be a significant set of factors in the final city selection, and we’ll post details right here.
You’ll notice a “PowerShell Summit” post category here on PowerShell.org; that’s your one and official source for news and info, with our Summit Page being your one and official source for more static information on both events. You can follow @PSHSummit on Twitter, which will be a good way to receive notifications of new posts here, but which will not contain any information not available on this site. We also try to hashtag #PSHSummit on Twitter, if you’d like to watch out for that.