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Leveraging WMI

The discussion in the first few chapters of this book focused on what you can do with Microsoft Visual Basic, Scripting Edition (VBScript). From a network management perspective, many useful tasks can be accomplished using just VBScript, but to truly begin to unleash the power of scripting, you need to bring in additional tools. This is where Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) comes into play. WMI was designed to provide access to many powerful ways of managing Microsoft Windows systems. In Windows Server 2003, WMI was expanded to include management of many aspects of server operations, including both configuration and reporting capabilities of nearly every facet of the server. Some of the tasks you can perform with WMI are:

  • Report on drive configuration

  • Report on available memory, both physical and virtual

  • Back up the event log

  • Modify the registry

  • Schedule tasks

  • Share folders

  • Switch from a static to a dynamic Internet Protocol (IP) address


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