Powershell Network Commands Cheat Sheet

| 02-05-2021
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Foreward

I haven't located a good cheat sheet for basic PowerShell commands to manage your Network Card/IP stack, so I thought I should make one. If you like this please share it with your mom because I'm sure she's been waiting to set a static IP address via PowerShell for some time. Also you should call her more.

Windows Server 2019 & PowerShell All-in-One For Dummies Cheat Sheet. PowerShell 5.1 is the current released version of Windows PowerShell and is the version that ships with Windows Server 2016 and Windows Server 2019. It is installed by default on these newer operating systems, but it’s also available for install on Windows Server 2008 R2.


This cheat sheet should help. PowerShell's native commands are all based on a verb-noun syntax, for example, 'get-childitem'. Command names are often quite verbose, so there is an extensive list of default aliases that help with common commands. The table below will give the alias, where available, as well as the native PowerShell command. Most Useful Powershell Commands to Find and Get Help with Cmdlets. You cannot talk about the. Pipe the output to another command Get-Service Get-Member Essential Commands To get help on any cmdlet use get-help Get-Help Get-Service To get all available cmdlets use get-command Get-Command To get all properties and methods for an object use get-member Get-Service Get-Member Creating Objects To create an instance of a com object.

My campaign against stock photography continues.

Assumptions


  • Windows 2012/Windows 8 or higher
  • Administrator access to the machine in question
  • Powershell ran as administrator on the machine in question


CMDLet List:

Most of the commands used to manipulate IP settings can be found by typing Get-Command -Module NetTCPIP

To find out more about any given command, type Get-Help <cmdlet name>

Common Tasks


Here are walkthroughs of some of the more common tasks you may want to perform.

List Network Adapters

 Gets a list of all adapters in the machine; you'll need to know your adapter name or index # (both listed) for some of the commands below.

Change an Adapter Friendly Name

 You may want to consider changing the friendly name of the adapter you intend to manipulate. By giving it shorter, more meaningful name you'll have an easier time going forward. Use the old name you got from the last command. Syntax is Rename-NetAdapter -Name '<Current Name>' -NewName <'New Name'>

Get the Current IP Address

 Gets all IPv4 addresses on the machine; you'll almost always have multiple as your loopback interface (127.0.0.1) will be listed. Ignore that guy.
Optionally, you can specify -InterfaceAlias <friendly name> or -InterfaceIndex <index #> to limit the command to a single adapter.

Assign a Static IP Address to your Network Adapter

 This command will set the one and only (overwriting what is there) IP address for the specified network adapter. You also can (and should) set the subnet mask with this command. The subnet mask is set via CIDR using the -PrefixLength; see the link for more info about CIDR, but if you're not familiar with CIDR it is likely that you want -PrefixLength 24 which translates to 255.255.255.0 meaning the first three octets are the network while the last is the host. Syntax is New-NetIPAddress -InterfaceAlias <name> -IPAddress <IP address> -PrefixLength <CIDR> -DefaultGateway <Gateway IP> . You can substitute -InterfaceIndex <index #> for -InterfaceAlias .
Note: You will get an error if you already have a static IP address with a default gateway. To fix this problem see 'Delete Existing Static IP' below and then try again.
Note2: We're not using 'Set-NetIPAddress' here because it doesn't allow you to set a default gateway. BOOOO.

Set DNS Servers for your Adapter

 To look up names you'll need to set DNS server(s). Syntax is Set-DNSClientServerAddress -InterfaceAlias <name> -ServerAddresses ('<IP Address 1','IP Address 2') . You can set as many DNS servers as you like. You can substitute -InterfaceIndex <index #> for -InterfaceAlias .

Set a Default Gateway

 It's generally easier to set the default gateway as part of the New-NetIPAddress command above, but if you want to set one separately see 'Set a Static Route' below.

Delete Existing Static IP (to prep for a new)

 This is a two step process; you need to delete the IP, then the gateway. No need to worry about the DNS servers here as it works to overwrite them with the command above. You will need to know the IP address you want to delete first; use get-netipaddress (above) to get it (write it down to use below if necessary). You'll then need to know the NextHop of the gateway. To get this, use the get-netroute command and write down the entry(ies) that have a nexthop of the gateway you intend to remove (see screenshot).
The syntax for these commands are
Remove-NetAddress <IPAddress> -Confirm:$False
Remove-NetRoute -NextHop <Gateway IPAddress> -Confirm:$False
Note: If you have multiple routes set with that default gateway it will delete them all. If you haven't manually set routes, don't worry about it (you just have the one).

Set Your Adapter to Use DHCP

 This is another two step process; first set the desired adapter IP/Gateway to DHCP then set the DNS servers to pull from DHCP as well.
The syntax for these commands are:
Set-NetIPInterface -InterfaceAlias <name> -Dhcp Enabled
Set-DNSClientServerAddress -InterfaceAlias <name> -ResetServerAddress
You can substitute -InterfaceIndex <index #> for -IterfaceAlias if you prefer.
Note: If you have a static gateway set you'll need to perform the second step 'Remove-NetRoute' from the step above as well.

Advanced Tasks


Here are walkthroughs of some of the more common tasks you may want to perform. My assumption here is that you know what you want to do so I won't be discussing the details of what each of these means.

Add/Delete a Static Route

 Add: (use -RouteMetric to specify metric or -PolicyStore to control persistence through reboots)
Add default route:

Windows Powershell Commands Cheat Sheet

Delete: (while this command is very specific you can be more generic; see above)

Test Network Connectivity (Ping)

Test-Connection replaces ping.exe. In addition to the ping functionality Test-Connection supports authentication (if firewall is set accordingly), multiple targets in a single command, running as a job, as well as more detailed returns.

Assign a DNS Suffix

 This is the domain under which your IP will be registered and under most circumstances will be used to append to hostname searches. Note this is per-adapter. You can substitute InterfaceIndex for InterfaceAlias if you like.

Assign an Additional IP Address to your NIC

 If you want to add another IP (usually only applicable on a server)

References/More Information

TechNet: Net TCP/IP Cmdlets in Windows PowerShell

Azure Powershell Commands Cheat Sheet


Sheet

Powershell 7 Cheat Sheet

TechNet: DNS Client Cmdlets in Windows PowerShell

Powershell Command Cheat Sheet Printable

TechNet: Network Adapter Cmdlets

Powershell Network Commands Cheat Sheet Download


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