Which applications does get-command detect?

I've been playing around a little with get-command to figure out which
"Applications" it detects if you give it a command like:

get-command * -commandType Application | more

It displays a ton of stuff under C:\Windows. The only other thing that
is displayed on my main machine are SQL Server 2005 files or Visual
Studio 2005 files. Nothing else. No Office apps, for example.

If you run the following commands do you see any applications other
than those from SQL Server 2005 or Visual Studio 2005?

get-command *.exe |
where-object {$_.Definition -notmatch "Windows"} |
more

Or to be more comprehensive

get-command *.exe,*.dll |
where-object {$_.Definition -notmatch "Windows"} |
more

Just curious.

Andrew Watt MVP

Hi Andrew,

> I've been playing around a little with get-command to figure out which
> "Applications" it detects if you give it a command like:
>
> get-command * -commandType Application | more
>
> It displays a ton of stuff under C:\Windows. The only other thing that
> is displayed on my main machine are SQL Server 2005 files or Visual
> Studio 2005 files. Nothing else. No Office apps, for example.

But it displays word documents etc, too - if they are in an application
search path. So I guess gcm displays all file types with a shell
execution handler (<- not sure if that's the right name). In other
words: gcm lists everything you can "start" in PS. If you copy a word
document to the windows directory, you can "start" this document by typing

PS> .\Document.doc

That's because word documents can be opened by means of "ShellExecute".
If you now type

PS> get-command *.doc -commandType Application | more

it should display the document.doc.

But I'm just guessing...

cu

Max

Hi again,

> If you copy a word
> document to the windows directory, you can "start" this document by typing
>
> PS> .\Document.doc

Sorry, that's a bad example ;-) You can actually open the document by
just typing

PS> Document.doc

regardless of the current directory.

cu

Hello Andrew,

> It displays a ton of stuff under C:\Windows. The only other thing that
> is displayed on my main machine are SQL Server 2005 files or Visual
> Studio 2005 files. Nothing else. No Office apps, for example.

Another issue might be, that the search method is obviously quite different
from the "Start button / Run command" box. For example, I type in IEXPLORE,
which opens the IE.

Not so in PowerShell. Probably this is because the PowerShell does not use
the AppPaths from the registry, which act as kind of an alternative search
path for executables:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\App Paths

Note they are not located under "Explorer" or any "Shell" entry, they're
general. Is there any reason why the powerShell should not use these paths?
Adding a custom function could be a solution. If anyone knows of a better
one, please let us know.

JensG