Windows Server 2012 : Managing networking using Windows PowerShell (part 2) - Examples of network-administration tasks

You can use the Get-NetAdapter cmdlet to display all network adapters on the server that have a link speed of 100 megabits per second (Mbps) like this:

PS C:\> Get-NetAdapter | Where-Object -FilterScript {$_.LinkSpeed -eq "100 Mbps"}

Name        InterfaceDescription       ifIndex Status  MacAddress         LinkSpeed
----         --------------------      ------- ------  ----------         ---------
Ethernet 2  Broadcom NetXtreme Gig...  13 Up           A4-BA-DB-0A-96-0C  100 Mbps
Ethernet    Broadcom NetXtreme Gig...  12 Up           A4-BA-DB-0A-96-0B  100 Mbps

The output of this command consists of objects that can be passed through the pipeline to other cmdlets. For example, you could pipe the output into the Set-NetIPInterface cmdlet to assign a metric value of 5 to all interfaces having a link speed of 100 Mbps as follows:

PS C:\> Get-NetAdapter | Where-Object -FilterScript {$_.LinkSpeed -eq "100 Mbps"} | `
Set-NetIPInterface -InterfaceMetric 5

You can enable and disable bindings on a network adapter using Windows PowerShell. For example, start by using the Get-NetAdapterBinding cmdlet to display the bindings for the specified interface:

PS C:\> Get-NetAdapterBinding -InterfaceAlias "Ethernet 2"

Name        DisplayName                                        ComponentID  Enabled
----        -----------                                        -----------  -------
Ethernet 2  Hyper-V Extensible Virtual Switch                  vms_pp       False
Ethernet 2  Link-Layer Topology Discovery Responder            ms_rspndr    True
Ethernet 2  Link-Layer Topology Discovery Mapper I/O Driver    ms_lltdio    True
Ethernet 2  Microsoft Network Adapter Multiplexor Protocol     ms_implat    False
Ethernet 2  Client for Microsoft Networks                      ms_msclient  True
Ethernet 2  Windows Network Virtualization Filter driver       ms_netwnv    False
Ethernet 2  QoS Packet Scheduler                               ms_pacer     True
Ethernet 2  File and Printer Sharing for Microsoft Networks    ms_server    True
Ethernet 2  Internet Protocol Version 6 (TCP/IPv6)             ms_tcpip6    True
Ethernet 2  Internet Protocol Version 4 (TCP/IPv4)             ms_tcpip     True

To disable a specific binding such as QoS Packet Scheduler, you can use the DisableNetAdapterBinding cmdlet like this:

PS C:\> Disable-NetAdapterBinding -Name "Ethernet 2" -ComponentID ms_pacer

You can use the Enable-NetAdapterBinding cmdlet to re-enable the binding.

You can disable a specific network adapter or even all network adapters using Windows PowerShell. For example, the following command disables the adapter named “Ethernet 2” with no confirmation prompt displayed:

PS C:\> Disable-NetAdapter -Name "Ethernet 2" -Confirm:$false

To disable all network adapters on the server, you can use this command:

PS C:\> Disable-NetAdapter -Name *

Note that all remote connectivity with the server will be lost if you do this.

To enable any network adapters that are disabled, you can use the Enable-NetAdapter cmdlet.

You can manage Windows Server 2012 DHCP servers using Windows PowerShell. Common DHCP server-management tasks include creating scopes, creating exclusion ranges, creating reservations, configuring scope and server options, and so on.

For example, let’s begin by viewing all the scopes currently configured on the DHCP server:

PS C:\> Get-DhcpServerv4Scope

ScopeId      SubnetMask      Name  State  StartRange   EndRange      LeaseDuration
-------      ----------      ----  -----  ----------   --------      -------------
172.16.11.0  255.255.255.0   test  Active 172.16.11.35 172.16.11.39  8.00:00:00

Note that there is currently only one active scope on the DHCP server. Now add a second scope for the IP address range 172.16.12.50 through 172.16.12.100. Leave the scope inactive until you finish configuring exclusions and reservations for it:

PS C:\> Add-DhcpServerv4Scope -EndRange 172.16.12.100 -Name test2 `
-StartRange 172.16.12.50 -SubnetMask 255.255.255.0 -State InActive

Note that in this cmdlet it doesn’t matter what order you specify the parameters in because you specified the end of the address range before specifying its beginning.

Running Get-DdhpServerv4Scope again indicates that adding the new scope was successful:

PS C:\> Get-DhcpServerv4Scope

ScopeId      SubnetMask      Name   State    StartRange    EndRange      LeaseDuration
-------      ----------      ----   -----    ----------    --------      -------------
172.16.11.0  255.255.255.0   test   Active   172.16.11.35  172.16.11.39  8.00:00:00
172.16.12.0  255.255.255.0   test2  Inactive 172.16.12.50  172.16.12.100 8.00:00:00

Now exclude the range 172.16.12.70 through 172.16.12.75 from the new scope:

PS C:\> Add-DhcpServerv4ExclusionRange -EndRange 172.16.12.75 -ScopeId 172.16.12.0 `
   -StartRange 172.16.12.70

Let’s also add a reservation for a file server:

PS C:\> Add-DhcpServerv4Reservation -ClientId EE-05-B0-DA-04-00 -IPAddress 172.16.12.88
`

   -ScopeId 172.16.12.0 -Description "Reservation for file server"

Here EE-05-B0-DA-04-00 represents the MAC address of the file server’s network adapter.

Let’s also configure a default gateway address for the new scope by creating a scope option as follows:

PS C:\> Set-DhcpServerv4OptionValue -Router 172.16.12.1 -ScopeId 172.16.12.0

If you want to create a server option instead of a scope option, you could do this by omitting the –ScopeID parameter from the preceding command.

Now you’re done creating and configuring the new scope, so let’s finish by activating it:

PS C:\> Set-DhcpServerv4Scope -StateActive