Powershell – If is not working (windows services checks)

February 3, 2022

I am trying to build my own script to check some Windows services (status and start mode) and I am facing an issue on the IF …
For example even if the service is "Running", it will never run the code inside the IF…

let me share my code below (I am a newbie on powershell so be gentle xD)

For info, I will do more actions inside the IF and ELSE, it is just for the example.

# import computers list, 1 by line
$Computers = get-content .\computers.txt

# define variable of services we want to check
$ServiceNetbios = "netbt"

# define variable to ask credentials
$Cred = Get-Credential

# declare Function to open a session a remote computer
Function EndPSS { Get-PSSession | Remove-PSSession }

EndPSS

########################################################
#                   BEGINNING OF SCRIPT                #
#                         by xxx                       #
#                       2022-02-03                     #
########################################################


# loop for each computer imported from the file
foreach ($computer in $computers) {
    
    # show name of computer in progress
    $computer

    # connect remotely to the computer
    $session = New-PSSession -ComputerName $computer -Credential $Cred

    # check Netbios service
    $StatusServiceNetbios = Invoke-Command -Session $session -ScriptBlock { Get-Service -Name $Using:ServiceNetbios | select -property * }
    
    # Check Netbios service started or not
    write-host $StatusServiceNetbios.Status
    
    if ($StatusServiceNetbios.Status -eq 'Running')
        {
           Write-host "IF Running"
        }
    else
    {
        write-host "IF NOT Running"
    }
    
EndPSS

}

and what return my script :

computername
Running           (<= the variable $StatusServiceNetbios.Status )
IF NOT Running    (<= the ELSE action)

Thanks you in advance for your help,
this drive me crazy and maybe this is very simple…

>Solution :

This is probably because of the way powershell creates service objects – (Get-Service netbt).Status has a child property named Value:

$StatusServiceNetbios.Status

Value  
-----  
Running

# so Status is never -eq to 'Running':
$StatusServiceNetbios.Status -eq 'Running'
False

# use the Value property in your If statement instead:
$StatusServiceNetbios.Status.Value -eq 'Running'
True