Export-Clixml

Export-Clixml
    [-Path] <String>
    -InputObject <PSObject>
    [-Depth <Int32>]
    [-Force]
    [-NoClobber]
    [-Encoding <Encoding>]
    [-WhatIf]
    [-Confirm]
    [<CommonParameters>]

Export-Clixml
    -LiteralPath <String>
    -InputObject <PSObject>
    [-Depth <Int32>]
    [-Force]
    [-NoClobber]
    [-Encoding <Encoding>]
    [-WhatIf]
    [-Confirm]
    [<CommonParameters>]

The Export-Clixml cmdlet serializes an object into a Common Language Infrastructure (CLI) XML-based representation and stores it in a file. You can then use the Import-Clixml cmdlet to recreate the saved object based on the contents of that file. For more information about CLI, see Language independence.

This cmdlet is similar to ConvertTo-Xml, except that Export-Clixml stores the resulting XML in a file. ConvertTo-Xml returns the XML, so you can continue to process it in PowerShell.

A valuable use of Export-Clixml on Windows computers is to export credentials and secure strings securely as XML. For an example, see Example 3.

This example creates an XML file that stores in the current directory, a representation of the string This is a test.

"This is a test" | Export-Clixml -Path .\sample.xml

The string This is a test is sent down the pipeline. Export-Clixml uses the Path parameter to create an XML file named sample.xml in the current directory.

This example shows how to export an object to an XML file and then create an object by importing the XML from the file.

Get-Acl C:\test.txt | Export-Clixml -Path .\FileACL.xml
$fileacl = Import-Clixml -Path .\FileACL.xml

The Get-Acl cmdlet gets the security descriptor of the Test.txt file. It sends the object down the pipeline to pass the security descriptor to Export-Clixml. The XML-based representation of the object is stored in a file named FileACL.xml.

The Import-Clixml cmdlet creates an object from the XML in the FileACL.xml file. Then, it saves the object in the $fileacl variable.

In this example, given a credential that you've stored in the $Credential variable by running the Get-Credential cmdlet, you can run the Export-Clixml cmdlet to save the credential to disk.

$Credxmlpath = Join-Path (Split-Path $PROFILE) TestScript.ps1.credential
$Credential | Export-Clixml $Credxmlpath
$Credxmlpath = Join-Path (Split-Path $PROFILE) TestScript.ps1.credential
$Credential = Import-Clixml $Credxmlpath

The Export-Clixml cmdlet encrypts credential objects by using the Windows Data Protection API. The encryption ensures that only your user account on only that computer can decrypt the contents of the credential object. The exported CLIXML file can't be used on a different computer or by a different user.

In the example, the file in which the credential is stored is represented by TestScript.ps1.credential. Replace TestScript with the name of the script with which you're loading the credential.

You send the credential object down the pipeline to Export-Clixml, and save it to the path, $Credxmlpath, that you specified in the first command.

To import the credential automatically into your script, run the final two commands. Run Import-Clixml to import the secured credential object into your script. This import eliminates the risk of exposing plain-text passwords in your script.

In this example, we create a PSCredential in the $Credential variable using the Get-Credential cmdlet. Then we use Export-Clixml to save the credential to disk.

PS> $Credential = Get-Credential

PowerShell credential request
Enter your credentials.
User: User1
Password for user User1: ********

PS> $Credential | Export-Clixml ./cred2.xml
PS> Get-Content ./cred2.xml

...
    <Props>
      <S N="UserName">User1</S>
      <SS N="Password">700061007300730077006f0072006400</SS>
    </Props>
...

PS> 'password' | Format-Hex -Encoding unicode

   Label: String (System.String) <52D60C91>

          Offset Bytes                                           Ascii
                 00 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 0A 0B 0C 0D 0E 0F
          ------ ----------------------------------------------- -----
0000000000000000 70 00 61 00 73 00 73 00 77 00 6F 00 72 00 64 00 p a s s w o r d

The output of Get-Content in this example has been truncate to focus on the credential information in the XML file. Note that the plain text value of the password is stored in the XML file as a Unicode character array as proven by Format-Hex. So the value is encoded but not encrypted.

This cmdlet supports the common parameters: -Debug, -ErrorAction, -ErrorVariable, -InformationAction, -InformationVariable, -OutBuffer, -OutVariable, -PipelineVariable, -ProgressAction, -Verbose, -WarningAction, and -WarningVariable. For more information, see about_CommonParameters.

You can pipeline any object to this cmdlet.

This cmdlet returns a FileInfo object representing the created file with the stored data.