PowerShell Pipeline ( | )
Windows PowerShell pipeline allows us to join two or more statements with a pipe symbol, sometimes called the '|' bar key. This tells PowerShell that we want to take the output of one command and pass it as the input to the next command. Let’s look at a simple example to better understand the power of Pipeline in Windows PowerShell.
Pipeline Example in Windows PowerShell
List all Services
The below Cmdlet lists all the services.
PS C:\ > Get-Service
![Windows PowerShell]()
We can clearly see the output of Get-Service. It returned all the services including stopped services. Let’s take ADWS service as an example.
Display ADWS service
To display ADWS service, we just need to specify it using the -Name parameter.
PS C: \ > Get-Service -Name ADWS
![Windows PowerShell]()
Note
As we can see the above results, ADWS service is currently Running.
Stop ADWS service
To stop ADWS service, we use Stop-service Cmdlet along with a -Name parameter to specify the ADWS Service name.
PS C:\ > Stop-Service -Name ADWS
![Windows PowerShell]()
Once we run the above Cmdlet, we can go back and verify the status of ADWS service.
Verify ADWS Service Status
PS C:\ > Get-Service -Name ADWS
![Windows PowerShell]()
From the screenshot, we can confirm that we successfully stopped ADWS service. This is one way of stopping a service. But there’s an efficient way to do this using PowerShell Pipeline ( | ). Let’s understand how we can use the Pipleline ( | ) to do this in a better and efficient way.
Understanding the Power of Pipeline in PowerShell
PowerShell Pipeline ( | ) takes output from one object and pass it as input to another object. The below examples explain the power of PowerShell Pipeline.
Example
PS C:\ > Get-Service -Name ADWS | Stop-Service
![Windows PowerShell]()
Important Note
The above Cmdlet performs two tasks. In the first task ( Get-Service ), it gets the ADWS service from the list of services, then using the Pipe ( | ) symbol, it passes the output of the Get-Service as an input to Stop-Service. So, the second task ( Stop-Service ) will stop ADWS service.