Lightning Demos from PowerShell Summit, PowerShell MSI Package Deprecation
+Jeff Hicks on the Future of PowerShell & AI
It’s been hard to watch the stream of pictures, posts, and other content come out of the PowerShell Devops 2026 Global Summit - I really wish I was there. That said, I’m looking forward to the wave of code, blog posts, and videos I suspect is coming soon. Also, sorry to get this out so late - I was kind of holding on for some last minute things from summit. Enjoy!
Lightning Demos from PowerShell Summit
Andrew Plaw hosted a live PowerShell Wednesday lightning demo session from PowerShell Summit featuring a great mix of quick fire projects. Highlights included James Brundage’s Reptile module for running PowerShell in a safe constrained web REPL, Justin Grody’s clever approach to shipping telemetry from any script to Azure Application Insights using a DLL already bundled with PowerShell 7, and Lucas Almond’s custom PS1XML format file that makes Intune managed device objects far more readable with color coded compliance states and clickable portal links. Morton Minster also joined remotely to debut his Andrew Pla module on the PowerShell Gallery, which is exactly what it sounds like and absolutely should not exist.
PowerShell MSI Package Deprecation starting with the new preview updates (v7.7 Preview 1)
Harm Veenstra has a quick but important heads up for anyone managing PowerShell deployments at scale. Starting with the 7.7 Preview 1 release, Microsoft is dropping the MSI installer in favor of MSIX, and the transition comes with some meaningful gaps right now, most notably that remoting and execution from system level services like Task Scheduler no longer work with NT AUTHORITY\SYSTEM or Group Managed Service Accounts. Microsoft says they are actively working on those scenarios, and existing releases including 7.6 will continue to get MSI packages, but if you are planning ahead for 7.7 GA this is worth knowing about sooner rather than later.
Harm’s piece: https://powershellisfun.com/2026/04/10/powershell-msi-package-deprecation-starting-with-the-new-preview-updates-v7-7-preview-1/
Here is a link to the Microsoft release about this: https://devblogs.microsoft.com/powershell/powershell-msi-deprecation/
PowerShell Wisdom from 35 Years in the Trenches with Jeff Hicks. The PowerShell Podcast E222
My good friend Andrew Plaw sits down with Jeff Hicks right before PowerShell Summit for a conversation that covers a lot of ground, from the organic origins of the Summit community back in the early days when laptops started opening in hotel lobbies, to how AI is likely to reshape the next decade of PowerShell careers, to what it actually means to learn PowerShell the right way by focusing on the core language and paradigm before diving into any specific technology stack.
Manage Microsoft 365 Groups Using a PowerShell Script
The AdminDroid team has published a solid Microsoft 365 group management script that covers 19 actions through a single tool, handling everything from creating groups and enabling Teams to assigning and removing licenses, bulk adding members, and restoring deleted groups. If you are managing groups at any kind of scale and still doing it through the portal, this is worth a look.
https://o365reports.com/microsoft-365-group-management-using-powershell/
Writing PowerShell for the Eventually Consistent Entra ID Database
Tony Redmond has a practical post expanding on a Microsoft developer blog about Entra ID’s eventually consistent architecture and what that means for your PowerShell scripts. The core advice is sensible: use delegated access with the ConsistencyLevel parameter when consistency matters, trust write responses instead of reading back to verify them, create fully populated objects in a single command rather than multi-step create-read-update workflows, use the identifiers returned by creation cmdlets rather than re-querying for them, and add retry logic with a brief pause when transient read failures do occur.
https://office365itpros.com/2026/04/13/eventually-consistent-entra-id/
REW-EQ-CopyPaste-Assistant
Ivan Bakhmutov has a handy open source utility called REW-EQ-CopyPaste-Assistant that takes the tedium out of transferring EQ filter settings from Room EQ Wizard into your DSP software. The tool runs in the background, watches your clipboard for copied EQ filter data, and then automates the keystroke and mouse click sequences needed to paste the values into your DSP app’s filter bands. It uses a JSON profile system so you can define sequences for different DSP software, and the repo already includes tested profiles for a wide range of brands including Musway, Zapco, Behringer, Powersoft, Goldhorn, and many others.
https://github.com/IvanBakhmutov/REW-EQ-CopyPaste-Assistant
Upcoming Events
PSConfEU 2026 June 1-4, 2026 in Wiesbaden, Germany
https://psconf.eu/