How do I Start a job of a function i just defined?

powershell jobs
Alex58 picture Alex58 · Aug 23, 2011 · Viewed 30k times · Source

How do I Start a job of a function i just defined?

function FOO { write-host "HEY" } Start-Job -ScriptBlock { FOO } |
Receive-Job

Receive-Job: The term 'FOO' is not recognized as the name of cmdlet,
function ,script file or operable program.

What do I do? Thanks.

Answer

Rynant picture Rynant · Aug 23, 2011

As @Shay points out, FOO needs to be defined for the job. Another way to do this is to use the -InitializationScript parameter to prepare the session.

For your example:

$functions = {
    function FOO { write-host "HEY" }
}

Start-Job -InitializationScript $functions -ScriptBlock {FOO}|
    Wait-Job| Receive-Job

This can be useful if you want to use the same functions for different jobs.

Related questions

Powershell: get output from Receive-Job

I have a collection of jobs that are running. When they complete I use receive-job and it writes the output to the screen. I'd like to take that output and log it to a file. I don't want to tee …

Read More
Powershell - how to pre-evaluate variables in a scriptblock for Start-Job

I want to use background jobs in Powershell. How to make variables evaluated at the moment of ScriptBlock definition? $v1 = "123" $v2 = "asdf" $sb = { Write-Host "Values are: $v1, $v2" } $job = Start-Job -ScriptBlock $sb $job | Wait-Job | Receive-Job $job | Remove-Job I get printed …

Read More
Determine installed PowerShell version

How can I determine what version of PowerShell is installed on a computer, and indeed if it is installed at all?

Read More