PowerShell

This page covers installing PowerShell 7 and related tools, configuring completion, the prompt, aliases and functions in $PROFILE, and fixing scp failures caused by the profile.

Installation#

Install the following tools with winget.

Install PowerShell 7:

winget install --id Microsoft.PowerShell

Install Starship:

winget install --id Starship.Starship

Install gsudo:

winget install gerardog.gsudo

Configuration#

All of the following goes in $PROFILE.

Set up completion and the prompt#

Add Tab menu completion and the Starship prompt to $PROFILE:

Set-PSReadlineKeyHandler -Key Tab -Function MenuComplete
Invoke-Expression (&starship init powershell)

Define aliases as functions#

PowerShell aliases cannot take arguments, so la, the git shortcuts and the nr shortcuts are all functions. Built-in aliases take precedence over functions, so remove la, gp (Get-ItemProperty), gl (Get-Location) and ni (New-Item) first, or the functions of the same name are never reached:

foreach ($a in "la", "gp", "gl", "ni") { Remove-Item "Alias:$a" -Force -ErrorAction Ignore }
function la { Get-ChildItem -Force @args }

-Force also lists hidden and system files.

Add the git and nr functions to $PROFILE:

function g { git @args }function gaa { git add --all @args }function gcmsg { git commit --message @args }function gp { git push @args }function gl { git pull @args }function gcl { git clone --recurse-submodules @args }function grt {    $root = git rev-parse --show-toplevel 2>$null    if ($root) { Set-Location $root } else { Write-Warning "Not inside a git repository" }}
function nio { ni --prefer-offline }function s { nr start }function d { nr dev }function b { nr build }function bw { nr build --watch }function t { nr test }function tu { nr test -u }function tw { nr test --watch }function w { nr watch }function p { nr play }function c { nr typecheck }function lint { nr lint }function lintf { nr lint --fix }function release { nr release }function re { nr release }

Functions#

Define the i function in $PROFILE to jump to a directory under $HOME\i:

function i {    param (        [string]$DirectoryName    )
    Set-Location -Path "$HOME\i\$DirectoryName"}

Runtimes#

Activate mise in $PROFILE:

(&mise activate pwsh) | Out-String | Invoke-Expression

Troubleshooting#

Profile output breaks scp#

When PowerShell is the OpenSSH DefaultShell, scp and sftp fail with:

scp: Received message too long 458961715scp: Ensure the remote shell produces no output for non-interactive sessions.

The profile is writing to stdout. Check the profile for echo, Write-Output and commands that print warnings, and remove or change them. For example, loading mise completions before activate prints usage CLI not found.

References#

• Guany PowerShell profile: Guany's PowerShell profile repository.