Desired State Configuration

Simple example - Enabling WindowsFeature

configuration EnableIISFeature
{
    node localhost
    {
        WindowsFeature IIS
        {
            Ensure = “Present”
            Name = “Web-Server”                      
        }
    }
}

If you run this configuration in Powershell (EnableIISFeature), it will produce a localhost.mof file. This is the “compiled” configuration you can run on a machine.

To test the DSC configuration on your localhost, you can simply invoke the following:

Start-DscConfiguration -ComputerName localhost -Wait 

Starting DSC (mof) on remote machine

Starting a DSC on a remote machine is almost just as simple. Assuming you’ve already set up Powershell remoting (or enabled WSMAN).

$remoteComputer = "myserver.somedomain.com"
$cred = (Get-Credential)
Start-DSCConfiguration -ServerName $remoteComputer -Credential $cred -Verbose

Nb: Assuming you have compiled a configuration for your node on your localmachine (and that the file myserver.somedomain.com.mof is present prior to starting the configuration)

Importing psd1 (data file) into local variable

Sometimes it can be useful to test your Powershell data files and iterate through the nodes and servers.

Powershell 5 (WMF5) added this neat little feature for doing this called Import-PowerShellDataFile .

Example:

$data = Import-PowerShellDataFile -path .\MydataFile.psd1
$data.AllNodes

List available DSC Resources

To list available DSC resources on your authoring node:

 Get-DscResource 

This will list all resources for all installed modules (that are in your PSModulePath) on your authoring node.

To list all available DSC resources that can be found in the online sources (PSGallery ++) on WMF 5 :

Find-DSCResource

Importing resources for use in DSC

Before you can use a resource in a configuration, you must explicitly import it. Just having it installed on your computer, will not let you use the resource implicitly.

Import a resource by using Import-DscResource .

Example showing how to import the PSDesiredStateConfiguration resource and the File resource.

Configuration InstallPreReqs
{
   param(); # params to DSC goes here.

   Import-DscResource PSDesiredStateConfiguration 

   File CheckForTmpFolder {
        Type = 'Directory'
        DestinationPath = 'C:\Tmp'
        Ensure = "Present"
    }
 }

Note: In order for DSC Resources to work, you must have the modules installed on the target machines when running the configuration. If you don’t have them installed, the configuration will fail.