Running PowerShell file in C#, how to do that in an ASP.NET form?

To Run powershell using C# program, you could use Process.Start() with "C:\WINDOWS\system32\windowspowershell\v1.0\powershell.exe", and provide appropriate powershell file argument.

For more information, please run

C:\WINDOWS\system32\windowspowershell\v1.0\powershell.exe -?

Regarding permission issue, please read Running Scripts From Within Windows PowerShell, and make sure powershell has a correct ExecutionPolicy.

Further Information: http://www.microsoft.com/technet/scriptcenter/resources/qanda/sept06/hey0926.mspx

Depending on how you're running your ASP.NET script (VS development server, or IIS), then you'll need to take account of the fact that the 'user' who's running the script is probably not you, and may not have the same access to the same things as you do.

You may well need to get further into it than "some error about permission etc", because that error is probably the very essence of your problem.

You may find that ProcMon (from www.sysinternals.com) is a useful tool for finding what the permissions problem is.

Another option you should look into is running the script within your code directly, which should eliminate the need for the text file all together.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms714661(VS.85).aspx

http://devcentral.f5.com/weblogs/Joe/archive/2009/01/16/powershell-abcs---r-is-for-runspace.aspx

http://bartdesmet.net/blogs/bart/archive/2007/02/05/a-first-introduction-to-windows-powershell-runspaces.aspx (see "Hosting a Runspace" at the end)

I would leverage the System.Management.Automation namespace and create a PowerShell console object. You can pass commands or .ps1 files - both with arguments - to it for execution. Much cleaner than a separate shell that will have to then call the powershell.exe.

Other things to ensure are appropriate are the identity of the application pool. Ensure it has the level of rights required to perform the PowerShell commands and/or scripts. Next, make sure you have you Set-ExecutionPolicy appropriately if you're going to execute script files.

Here's the code executing commands submitted by a TextBox web form as if it were a a PowerShell console using these objects - should illustrate the approach:

using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
using System.Web;
using System.Web.UI;
using System.Web.UI.WebControls;
using System.Management.Automation;
using System.Text;

namespace PowerShellExecution
{
    public partial class Default : System.Web.UI.Page
    {
        protected void Page_Load(object sender, EventArgs e)
        {

        }

        protected void ExecuteCode_Click(object sender, EventArgs e)
        {
            // Clean the Result TextBox
            ResultBox.Text = string.Empty;

            // Initialize PowerShell engine
            var shell = PowerShell.Create();

            // Add the script to the PowerShell object
            shell.Commands.AddScript(Input.Text);

            // Execute the script
            var results = shell.Invoke();

            // display results, with BaseObject converted to string
            // Note : use |out-string for console-like output
            if (results.Count > 0)
            {
                // We use a string builder ton create our result text
                var builder = new StringBuilder();

                foreach (var psObject in results)
                {
                    // Convert the Base Object to a string and append it to the string builder.
                    // Add \r\n for line breaks
                    builder.Append(psObject.BaseObject.ToString() + "\r\n");
                }

                // Encode the string in HTML (prevent security issue with 'dangerous' caracters like < >
                ResultBox.Text = Server.HtmlEncode(builder.ToString());
            }
        }
    }
}

To do this when a page loads, you'll want to create a function that meets your needs and call it from the "Page_Load" function.

Here's is a write up for you that covers how to create a page from start to finish with Visual Studio and get this done, http://grokgarble.com/blog/?p=142.

Please up-vote and mark appropriately if helpful.

Thanks, Jeff