dsccommunity
xService: cannot be used for Computer Browser Service if it is not installed
Problem description
I want to make sure the service "Computer Browser" is not installed on my devices. Unfortunately there seems to be a Problem combined with the way Get-Service works (-Name also seems to look for DisplayName, if there is no hit) and the fact that Microsoft has this great combination of Services:
| # | Name | DisplayName | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Browser | Computer Browser | This is a "normal" service, that you can see in Services.msc |
| 2 | Bowser | Browser | Apparently this is the "Browser Support Driver" |
As a result, Get-Service, which is called in line 52 of DSC_xServiceResource.psm1 returns the Bowser Service, rather than the Browser, which I am looking for. Regardless of Browser only being the DisplayName and not Name. Next, it tries to execute "Get-ServiceCimInstance -ServiceName $Name", which will be empty, as this won't work for Bowser Service. This then leads to the String-Conversion failing, as there is no return value from and thus no StartMode ($startupType = ConvertTo-StartupTypeString -StartMode $serviceCimInstance.StartMode)
Verbose logs
PowerShell DSC resource DSC_xServiceResource failed to execute Test-TargetResource functionality with error message: The property 'StartMode' cannot be found on this object. Verify that the property exists.
+ CategoryInfo : InvalidOperation: (:) [], CimException
+ FullyQualifiedErrorId : ProviderOperationExecutionFailure
+ PSComputerName : DESKTOP-55FBL3B
DSC configuration
instance of DSC_xServiceResource as $DSC_xServiceResource1ref
{
Name = "Browser";
Ensure = "Absent";
ModuleName = "xPSDesiredStateConfiguration";
ResourceID = "[xService]Browser";
ModuleVersion = "9.1.0";
ConfigurationName = "ServiceConfig";
};
instance of OMI_ConfigurationDocument
{
Version="2.0.0";
MinimumCompatibleVersion = "1.0.0";
CompatibleVersionAdditionalProperties= {"Omi_BaseResource:ConfigurationName"};
};
Suggested solution
Imo, Get-Service should not fall back to DisplayName, but I don't think that will ever happen. So, maybe a check if (get-service -name browser).Name (in this case Bowser) equals the input-value when checking the Service (in this case "Browser")
Operating system the target node is running
OsName : Microsoft Windows 10 Pro
OsOperatingSystemSKU : 48
OsArchitecture : 64-bit
WindowsVersion : 2009
WindowsBuildLabEx : 19041.1.amd64fre.vb_release.191206-1406
OsLanguage : en-US
OsMuiLanguages : {en-US}
PowerShell version and build the target node is running
Name Value
---- -----
PSVersion 5.1.19041.2364
PSEdition Desktop
PSCompatibleVersions {1.0, 2.0, 3.0, 4.0...}
BuildVersion 10.0.19041.2364
CLRVersion 4.0.30319.42000
WSManStackVersion 3.0
PSRemotingProtocolVersion 2.3
SerializationVersion 1.1.0.1
xPSDesiredStateConfiguration version
Name Version Path
---- ------- ----
xPSDesiredStateConfiguration 9.1.0 C:\Program Files\WindowsPowerShell\Modules\xPSDesiredStateConfiguration\9.1.0\xPSDesiredStateConfiguration.psd1
Can confirm that the parameter -Name also looks at the DisplayName, even though there exist a separate parameter -DisplayName on the command. This seems how Get-Service command is built and we cannot prevent that. I think the best option is to add a parameter Exclude that takes a string array so when it returns wrong services we can remove them, e.g. get-service -Name browser -Exclude 'bowser' 🤔
So, maybe a check if (get-service -name browser).Name (in this case Bowser) equals the input-value when checking the Service (in this case "Browser")
Good suggestion but I think this could possibly be a breaking change if this Get-Service bug actually make it work in another case. 🤔 So suggest adding the Exclude parameter instead.
Here is a similar discussion from the PS github: https://github.com/PowerShell/PowerShell/issues/21312
Sadly above issue was closed with the information that this will not be fixed and instead just be regarded as documentation bug, which I do not agree with, as this isn't even consistently working to return kernel-drivers and "bowser" is the only kernel driver being returned that way. I really had hoped there would at least be the addition of a proper paramater that does work as it should, but apparently this cannot be helped. https://github.com/MicrosoftDocs/PowerShell-Docs/issues/10966