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Using Evergreen

Get-EvergreenApp is used to return application details by specifying an application with the -Name parameter.

For example, let's find the latest version of the Microsoft FSLogix Apps agent:

Get-EvergreenApp -Name "MicrosoftFSLogixApps"

This will return output similar to the following that lists the version number and download URL for the application. This application output also includes the release date:

Version : 2.9.7979.62170
Date    : 9/11/2021
Channel : Production
URI     : https://download.microsoft.com/download/3/f/7/3f755dbd-debe-46d4-811c-3e7c87bc4408/FSLogix_Apps_2.9.7979.62170.zip

All output properties are strings that can be acted on with other functions and cmdlets including filtering the output with Where-Object.

Output

Each Evergreen application returns at least two properties in the object is sends to the pipeline:

  • Version - a string property that is the version number of the application. If you need these in a version format, cast them with [System.Version]
  • URI - a string property that is the download location for the latest version of the application. These will be publicly available locations that provide installers in typically Windows installer formats, e.g., exe, msi. Some downloads may be in other formats, such as zip that will need to be extracted before install

Several applications may include additional properties in their output, which will often require filtering, including:

  • Architecture - the processor architecture of the installer
  • Type - an application may return installer downloads in exe, msi, zip, format etc. In some instances, Type may return slightly different data
  • Ring, Channel, and/or Release - some applications include different release rings or channels for enterprise use. The value of this property is often unique to that application
  • Language - some application installers may support specific languages
  • Date - in some cases, Evergreen can return the release date of the returned version

Filter Output

Where an application returns more than one object to the pipeline, you will need to filter the output with Where-Object or Sort-Object. For example, Get-EvergreenApp -Name MicrosoftTeams returns both the 32-bit and 64-bit versions of the General and Preview release rings ot the Microsoft Teams installer. As most environments should be on 64-bit Windows these days, we can filter the 64-bit version of Teams with:

Get-EvergreenApp -Name "MicrosoftTeams" | Where-Object { $_.Architecture -eq "x64" -and $_.Ring -eq "General" -and $_.Type -eq "msi" }

This will return details of the 64-bit Microsoft Teams installer that we can use in a script.

Version      : 1.4.00.32771
Ring         : General
Architecture : x64
Type         : msi
URI          : https://statics.teams.cdn.office.net/production-windows-x64/1.4.00.32771/Teams_windows_x64.msi

Use Output

With the filtered output we can download the latest version of Microsoft Teams before copying it to a target location or installing it directly to the current system. The following commands filters Get-EvergreenApp -Name MicrosoftTeams to get the latest version and download, then downloads the installer with Save-EvergreenApp and finally uses msiexec to install Teams in a VDI supported configuration:

$Teams = Get-EvergreenApp -Name "MicrosoftTeams" | Where-Object { $_.Architecture -eq "x64" -and $_.Ring -eq "General" -and $_.Type -eq "msi" }
$TeamsInstaller = $Teams | Save-EvergreenApp -Path "C:\Temp\Teams"
& "$env:SystemRoot\System32\msiexec.exe" "/package $($TeamsInstaller.FullName) ALLUSER=1 ALLUSERS=1 /quiet"

Parameters

Name

The -Name parameter is used to specify the application name to return details for. This is a required parameter. The list of supported applications can be found with Find-EvergreenApp.

Verbose

The -Verbose parameter can be useful for observing where the application details are obtained from (e.g. the application update URL) and for troubleshooting when the expected application details are not returned.

Alias

Get-EvergreenApp has an alias of gea to simplify retrieving application details, for example:

PS /Users/aaron> gea Slack

Version      : 4.14.0
Platform     : PerMachine
Architecture : x64
URI          : https://downloads.slack-edge.com/releases/windows/4.14.0/prod/x64/slack-standalone-4.14.0.0.msi