Abstract: The present mechanism provides various capabilities for resolving strings within a command string. The present mechanism operates within an interactive operating environment by receiving a plurality of strings. For any string this is partially resolved, the mechanism initiates analysis for completely resolving the string. The mechanisms support wildcarding, property sets, relations, conversions, property paths, extended types, data type coercing, and the like.

Abstract: The present mechanism obtains constraints within an interactive environment, associates these constraints with constructs, and then applies these constraints to the constructs when encountering the constructs. The constraints may be saved in metadata associated with the respective construct. The constraints may specify a data type for the construct, a predicate directive, a documentation directive, a parsing directive, a data generation directive, a data validation directive, or an object processing and encoding directive. The constraints are extendable to support other directives. The mechanism allows interactive users to easily specify constraints interactively.

Abstract: The present mechanism allows commands entered on a command line in a command line operating environment the ability to execute in a first execution mode or an alternate execution mode. The command is executed in the alternate execution mode if the command includes an instruction to execute in the alternate execution mode. The alternate execution mode is provided by the operating environment and provides extended functionality to the command. The alternate execution mode may visually display results of executing the command, visually display simulated results of executing the command, prompt for verification before executing the command, may perform a security check to determine whether a user requesting the execution has sufficient privileges to execute the command, and the like.

Abstract: In an administrative tool environment, user input is supplied to an administrative tool framework for processing. The administrative tool framework maps user input to cmdlet objects. The cmdlet objects describe a grammar for parsing the user input and input objects to obtain expected input parameters. The input objects are emitted by one cmdlet and are available as input to another cmdlet. The input objects may be any precisely parseable input, such as .NET objects, plain strings, XML documents, and the like. The cmdlets may operate within the same process. Alternatively, one cmdlet may operate locally while another cmdlet operates remotely. The cmdlets may be provided by the administrative tool framework or may be provided by third party developers. The user input may be supplied to the framework via a host cmdlet.

Abstract: The present mechanism provides a grammar for specifying required prerequisites (e.g., number and type of input parameters) that an object must possess in order for processing to occur on the object. The mechanism allows programmers and non-programmers to easily specify these prerequisites. The prerequisites may be associated directly or indirectly with a data structure. For a direct specification, the data structure comprises a parameter declaration for each expected input parameter. For an indirect specification, the data structure comprises a parameter definition that references an external description, such as in an XML document. The data structure also providing a mechanism that identifies a corresponding parameter within an input source for each expected input parameter based on its declaration. The mechanism further populates each expected input parameter with information associated with the corresponding parameter when the data structure becomes instantiated into an object.

Abstract: The present mechanism provides a data driven command line output within an environment that supports a pipeline of object-based commands. Each object-based command inputs a parseable object for processing and outputs another parseable object for subsequent command processing. The mechanism is operative to direct formatting and subsequent processing of the commands based on a type of the incoming parseable object. Format information is obtained for the type, such as shape, properties to display, and the like. The format information may be specified within an XML-based document. The mechanism utilizes one or more output processing commands, such as format commands, markup commands, convert commands, transform commands, and out commands. These output processing commands may be arranged within the pipeline in various ways to achieve the desired output results.

Abstract: The present mechanism provides a data driven command line output within an environment that supports a pipeline of object-based commands. Each object-based command inputs a parseable object for processing and outputs another parseable object for subsequent command processing. The parseable objects do not have methods. The mechanism is operative to direct formatting and subsequent processing of the commands based on a type of the incoming parseable object. Format information is obtained for the type, such as shape, properties to display, and the like. The format information may be specified within an XML-based document. The mechanism utilizes one or more output processing it commands, such as format commands, markup commands, convert commands, transform commands, and out commands. These output processing commands may be arranged within the pipeline in various ways to achieve the desired output results.

Abstract: A method and system for providing a computing device control interface are provided. A system administrator accesses a graphical user interface and selects a group of actions that are to be executed by a number of computing devices. The actions selected by the system administrator are embodied in a graphical action icon and displayed on the graphical user interface. The system administrator initiates the actions by manipulating the action icon such that it overlaps a computer icon, which embodies one or more computing devices within the network that will execute the selected actions. The computing device icon is also displayed on the user interface. The user interface executes the selected action on the selected computer and then generates an archive file embodying the execution of the selected actions on the selected group of computing devices.

Abstract: A method and system for providing a computing device control interface are provided. A system administrator accesses a graphical user interface and selects a group of actions that are to be executed by a number of computing devices. The actions selected by the system administrator are embodied in a graphical action icon and displayed on the graphical user interface. The system administrator initiates the actions by manipulating the action icon such that it overlaps a computer icon, which embodies one or more computing devices within the network that will execute the selected actions. The computing device icon is also displayed on the user interface. The user interface executes the selected action on the selected computer and then generates an archive file embodying the execution of the selected actions on the selected group of computing devices.

Abstract: The present invention is directed at a reflection-based shell that provides reflection-based processing of input parameters for a command. The reflection-based processing includes parsing, data generation, data validation, object encoding, object processing, documentation, and the like. The reflection-based shell provides a mechanism for specifying a grammar for the input parameters using a class. The method includes receiving a parsable stream that includes a command and at least one parameter. Retrieving definitional information that describes an expected parameter for the command. Using the definitional information to create an object for storing the at least one parameter in a format in accordance with the description of the expected parameters. Passing the object to the command. The object not having a method invocable by the command.