ShowUI Getting Started With ShowUI

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ShowUI is a Module to help you create user interfaces in PowerShell

Using ShowUI, you can create user interaces quickly, cheerly, and nicely, in an amazingly short amount of code.

This is the smallest 'Hello World' you can do in ShowUI:

label 'Hello World' -Show

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label is an alias to New-Label. Let's write this the "long" way, and add a few options.

-Content is the stuff inside of the label.

The content is usually the first parameter

-FontSize makes it bigger.

-FontWeight makes it bolder.

-FontFamily changes the font used to display the label -AsJob runs the label in the background, instead of stopping your script

New-Label 'Hello World' -FontFamily 'Consolas' -FontSize 24 -FontWeight Bold -AsJob

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There are hundreds of built in commands to choose from.

ShowUI has a command to help you find them:

Get-UICommand

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There plenty of controls to pick from You can put up a textbox

New-TextBox -text 'default' -show

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You can make a password box

New-PasswordBox -password 'secrets' -show

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Scribble on an InkCanvas

New-InkCanvas -width 640 -height 480 -show

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Create simple shapes and layout

New-UniformGrid -Width 200 -Height 200 {            
    New-Rectangle 'Red'            
    New-Rectangle 'Green'            
    New-Rectangle 'Blue'               
    New-Rectangle 'Yellow'            
} -show

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Create menus

New-Menu -ControlName SampleMenu {             
    New-MenuItem "File" {            
        New-MenuItem "E_xit" -on_click {             
            $window.Close()            
        }             
    }            
} -show

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Display photos

$picture = Get-ChildItem "$env:PUBLIC\Pictures\Sample Pictures" |             
    Get-Random            
New-Image -Source "$($picture.Fullname)" -Width 640 -Height 480 -show

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Let's go ahead and try something more practical: Let's make a quick UI that will help us get input for a command.

This uses a UniformGrid, a handy control that comes with ShowUI and WPF that lets you automatically put items into a grid

$getCommandInput = UniformGrid -ControlName 'Get-InputForGetCommand' -Columns 2 {            
    "Command Name"            
    New-TextBox -Name Name            
    "Verb"            
    New-TextBox -Name Verb            
    "Noun"            
    New-TextBox -Name Noun            
    "In Module"            
    New-TextBox -Name Module              
    " " # Some Empty Space            
    New-Button "Get Command" -On_Click {            
        Get-ParentControl |            
            Set-UIValue -passThru |             
            Close-Control            
    }            
} -show            
            
Get-Command @getCommandInput

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Let's take the coolness up a notch, and show something that will help provide input for Get-EventLog

$getEventInput = StackPanel -ControlName 'Get-EventLogsSinceDate' {            
    New-Label -VisualStyle 'MediumText' "Get Event Logs Since..."            
    New-ComboBox -IsEditable:$false -SelectedIndex 0 -Name LogName @("Application", "Security", "System", "Setup")            
    Select-Date -Name After            
    New-Button "Get Events" -On_Click {            
        Get-ParentControl |            
            Set-UIValue -passThru |             
            Close-Control            
    }            
} -show            
            
Get-EventLog @getEventInput

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All right, let's show something a little more practical and a little cooler.

Let's make a very simple session manager in ShowUI:

New-Grid -ControlName 'SessionManager' -Rows (            
    'Auto', # Automatically sized header row            
    '1*',   # The remaining space will be where the list of sessions is displayed            
    'Auto' # Buttons will go along the bottom            
) {            
    "Active Sessions"            
    New-ListView -Row 1 -Name SessionList -View {            
        New-GridView -Columns {            
            New-GridViewColumn -Header 'Id' -DisplayMemberBinding 'Id'            
            New-GridViewColumn 'Name'            
            New-GridViewColumn 'ComputerName'            
            New-GridViewColumn 'ConfigurationName'            
            New-GridViewColumn 'State'            
        }            
    }            
                
    New-UniformGrid -Row 2 -Rows 1 {            
        New-Button "_Open" -Name OpenSession -On_Click {            
            # It's very easy to do nested dialogs.  Simply create a new control inside of            
            # an event handler, and use -Show.            
            $sessionParameters = New-UniformGrid -ControlName 'Get-RemoteSessionOption' -Columns 2 {            
                'ComputerName'            
                New-TextBox -Name 'ComputerName'            
                'ConfigurationName'                            
                New-TextBox -Name 'ConfigurationName'            
                'Authentication'            
                New-ComboBox -Name 'Authentication' -SelectedIndex 0 -ItemsSource {            
                    [Enum]::GetValues([Management.Automation.Runspaces.AuthenticationMechanism])            
                }            
                New-Button "Connect" -On_Click {            
                    $parent |            
                        Update-UIValue -passThru |            
                        Close-Control            
                }            
                New-Button "Connect As..." -On_Click {            
                    $parent | Update-UIValue            
                    $parent.Tag.Credential = Get-Credential            
                                
                    $parent | Close-Control                                                    
                }            
            } -show            
            if ($sessionParameters) {            
                New-PSSession @sessionParameters            
                $sessionList.ItemsSource = @(Get-PSSession)               
            }            
        }            
        New-Button "_Close" -On_Click {            
            $sessionList.SelectedItem | Remove-PSSession            
            $sessionList.ItemsSource = @(Get-PSSession)                
        }            
    }                        
} -On_Loaded {            
    $sessionList.ItemsSource = @(Get-PSSession)                
} -show