Another first for the blog, a response to another post. I recently read a post by one of my good friends Anthony Nocentino titled "Ten Years of PowerShell". I've known Anthony for years and I always like reading posts where he is a little more vulnerable and talking about his history in the industry and what he was feeling at the time. I think in this world where it's easy to separate the humanity from the technology, it's important to remind folks that we are all just humans doing our best. In his post he mentioned some things that really resonated with me and made me realize why we get along so well in and out of work (we both work at Everpure - previously known as Pure Storage). So I wanted to share my own story about PowerShell, and probably ramble on about other nonsense as well.

PowerWhat?

Much like Anthony, I am a Linux guy. I've been using Linux daily for almost 30 years. Bash scripting is how I used to automate. In the Windows world I had used some VBScript and some Python, but never really found anything as powerful as Bash. One day (in February 2014) I got an email from another friend, he was a system admin and was trying to use PowerShell to set user photos in Active Directory, his script wasn't working and he needed some help. I have always been a developer at heart so he figured I could help. I had never seen PowerShell before but took a crack at it anyways and ended up getting it working. I never really turned back after that.

I don't have Visual Studio

The thing that really clicked with PowerShell for me was the simplicity. Not in writing the code so much as in the tooling. Prior to discovering PowerShell if I wanted to share some code with co-workers they would need to battle with Python on Windows or install Visual Studio so they could compile some C# code. PowerShell changed that. Does it have the nicest syntax and conventions? No. Does it have some strange behaviors you have to reason about (I am looking at you, single-item arrays)? Yes. But the friction involved in sharing and running PowerShell code is almost zero.

PowerShell enabled me to start writing a lot more automation code and then easily share that code with co-workers in such a way that they could help add to it, and maintain it, without having to install a bunch of special tooling.

Growth

It's easy to share, so what? PowerShell allowed me to scale and grow my team. Thinking about it while writing this, I think PowerShell was the tool I used to understand my own passion for scaling and growing people and teams. With PowerShell I could solve a problem, and then hand that solution off to other people on my team so they could use it and improve it. This allowed everyone to move faster and accelerate. I think this pattern might have been the first time I got to see what it was like to build something that enabled others. That's what lead me to my various management roles in the past, and my current Solution Architect role: I like to build stuff that can help other people scale.

In my current role I build things that enable folks in the field to scale. I like to present because it helps people solve real problems and think about problems in new ways. I like to build tools because it can help someone get unstuck and get more done, or simply get some friction out of their way. It all comes down to scaling and growth.

Thanks

So, like Anthony, I think I need to say thanks to the whole PowerShell team. The thing they built accelerated my career and helped me define what I am passionate about. Not everybody gets to have that in their lives, so I am extremely greatful.