Tech Blog

Recently I needed to install some software on a bunch of machines but being the lazy git that I am I decided I couldn’t be bothered to walk upstairs, run the installer as me and install the software…so instead I created three convoluted batch scripts to do it:

Few things to note: I’m using PS Tools to run the scripts with my domain admin account, this is the same as shift right clicking the software as running as me!

I’m also using PS Tools to specify a list of PC’s!

Script one:

Copies an installation exe file from a server to a PC:

xcopy "\\SERVER\Software\LOnline.exe" "c:\"  /Y /R

Script two:

Looks at a list of PC’s and runs the above script for each PC in the list:

PsExec.exe @c:\Computers.txt -u DOMAIN\USER -p PASSWORD -c  "c:\CopyToPC.bat" > c:\commands1.log

Script three:

Looks at a list of PC’s then remotely installs the file LOnline.exe that you just copied to the pc remotely, I’m running the exe interactively when it’s done it pops a message to tell the user its done!!:

psexec.exe @C:\Computers.txt -d -i -u DOMAIN\USERNAME -p PASSWORD c:\LOnline.exe /i

I’m sure there is a much easier way of doing the above in one script but this was a very quick solution I put together!!

This is good one if you need to find a computer name and IP address and cant be bothered to get up and look.

Download Microsoft PSTOOLS specifically PSLOGGEDON from the suite.

Put the files somewhere easy to get to from a command prompt.

Its best to be logged onto as a Administrator.

Open CMD and navigate to the PSTOOLS location:

At the prompt type: PSLOGGEDON USERNAME  (i.e. the username of the person your looking for)

Hit enter and PSLOGGEDON will search through the registry of any PC on the domain for the credentials (very quickly). It will bring back which PC your user is logged onto both locally and remotely (i.e. if the user is RDP’D somewhere or is using a roaming profile).

Note; you don’t need to be logged on as Admin to run this, although some registries may be restricted