Edit

Share via

What's New in PowerShell 7.3

PowerShell 7.3 is the next stable release, built on .NET 7.0.

PowerShell 7.3 includes the following features, updates, and breaking changes.

Breaking Changes and Improvements

  • In this release, Windows APIs were updated or removed for compliance, which means that PowerShell 7.3 doesn't run on Windows 7. While Windows 7 is no longer supported, previous builds could run on Windows 7.
  • PowerShell Direct for Hyper-V is only supported on Windows 10, version 1809 and higher.
  • Test-Connection is broken due to an intentional breaking change in .NET 7. It's tracked by #17018
  • Add clean block to script block as a peer to begin, process, and end to allow easy resource cleanup (#15177)
  • Change default for $PSStyle.OutputRendering to Host
  • Make Out-String and Out-File keep string input unchanged (#17455)
  • Move the type data definition of System.Security.AccessControl.ObjectSecurity to the Microsoft.PowerShell.Security module (#16355) (Thanks @iSazonov!)
    • Before this change, a user doesn't need to explicitly import the Microsoft.PowerShell.Security module to use the code properties defined for an instance of System.Security.AccessControl.ObjectSecurity.
    • After this change, a user needs to explicitly import Microsoft.PowerShell.Security module in order to use those code properties and code methods.

Tab completion improvements

  • PowerShell 7.3 includes PSReadLine 2.2.6, which enables Predictive IntelliSense by default. For more information, see about_PSReadLine.
  • Fix tab completion within the script block specified for the ValidateScriptAttribute. (#14550) (Thanks @MartinGC94!)
  • Added tab completion for loop labels after break/continue (#16438) (Thanks @MartinGC94!)
  • Improve Hashtable completion in multiple scenarios (#16498) (Thanks @MartinGC94!)
    • Parameter splatting
    • Arguments parameter for Invoke-CimMethod
    • FilterHashtable parameter for Get-WinEvent
    • Property parameter for the CIM cmdlets
    • Removes duplicates from member completion scenarios
  • Support forward slashes in network share (UNC path) completion (#17111) (Thanks @sba923!)
  • Improve member autocompletion (#16504) (Thanks @MartinGC94!)
  • Prioritize ValidateSet completions over Enums for parameters (#15257) (Thanks @MartinGC94!)
  • Add type inference support for generic methods with type parameters (#16951) (Thanks @MartinGC94!)
  • Improve type inference and completions (#16963) (Thanks @MartinGC94!)
    • Allows methods to be shown in completion results for ForEach-Object -MemberName
    • Prevents completion on expressions that return void like ([void](""))
    • Allows non-default Class constructors to show up when class completion is based on the AST
  • Improve type inference for $_ (#17716) (Thanks @MartinGC94!)
  • Fix type inference for ICollection (#17752) (Thanks @MartinGC94!)
  • Prevent braces from being removed when completing variables (#17751) (Thanks @MartinGC94!)
  • Add completion for index expressions for dictionaries (#17619) (Thanks @MartinGC94!)
  • Fix type completion for attribute tokens (#17484) (Thanks @MartinGC94!)
  • Improve dynamic parameter tab completion (#17661) (Thanks @MartinGC94!)
  • Avoid binding positional parameters when completing parameter in front of value (#17693) (Thanks @MartinGC94!)

Improved error handling

  • Set $? correctly for command expression with redirections (#16046)
  • Fix a casting error when using $PSNativeCommandUseErrorActionPreference (#15993)
  • Make the native command error handling optionally honor ErrorActionPreference (#15897)
  • Specify the executable path as TargetObject for non-zero exit code ErrorRecord (#16108) (Thanks @rkeithhill!)

Session and remoting improvements

  • Add -Options to the PSRP over SSH commands to allow passing OpenSSH options directly (#12802) (Thanks @BrannenGH!)
  • Add -ConfigurationFile parameter to pwsh to allow starting a new process with the session configuration defined in a .pssc file (#17447)
  • Add support for using New-PSSessionConfigurationFile on non-Windows platforms (#17447)

Updated cmdlets

  • Add -HttpVersion parameter to web cmdlets (#15853) (Thanks @hayhay27!)
  • Add support to web cmdlets for open-ended input tags (#16193) (Thanks @farmerau!)
  • Fix ConvertTo-Json -Depth to allow 100 at maximum (#16197) (Thanks @KevRitchie!)
  • Improve variable handling when calling Invoke-Command with the $Using: expression (#16113) (Thanks @dwtaber!)
  • Add -StrictMode to Invoke-Command to allow specifying strict mode when invoking command locally (#16545) (Thanks @Thomas-Yu!)
  • Add clean block to script block as a peer to begin, process, and end to allow easy resource cleanup (#15177)
  • Add -Amended switch to Get-CimClass cmdlet (#17477) (Thanks @iSazonov)
  • Changed ConvertFrom-Json -AsHashtable to use ordered hashtable (#17405)
  • Removed ANSI escape sequences in strings before sending to Out-GridView (#17664)
  • Added the Milliseconds parameter to New-TimeSpan (#17621) (Thanks @NoMoreFood!)
  • Show optional parameters when displaying method definitions and overloads (#13799) (Thanks @eugenesmlv!)
  • Allow commands to still be executed even if the current working directory no longer exists (#17579)
  • Add support for HTTPS with Set-AuthenticodeSignature -TimeStampServer (#16134) (Thanks @Ryan-Hutchison-USAF!)
  • Render decimal numbers in a table using current culture (#17650)
  • Add type accelerator ordered for OrderedDictionary (#17804) (Thanks @fflaten!)
  • Add find.exe to legacy argument binding behavior for Windows (#17715)
  • Add -NoProfileLoadTime switch to pwsh (#17535) (Thanks @rkeithhill!)

For a complete list of changes, see the Change Log in the GitHub repository.

Experimental Features

In PowerShell 7.3, following experimental features became mainstream:

  • PSAnsiRenderingFileInfo - This feature adds the $PSStyle.FileInfo member and enables coloring of specific file types.

  • PSCleanBlock - Adds clean block to script block as a peer to begin, process, and end to allow easy resource cleanup.

  • PSAMSIMethodInvocationLogging - Extends the data sent to AMSI for inspection to include all invocations of .NET method members.

  • PSNativeCommandArgumentPassing - PowerShell now uses the ArgumentList property of the StartProcessInfo object rather than the old mechanism of reconstructing a string when invoking a native executable.

    PowerShell 7.3.1 adds sqlcmd.exe to the list of native commands in Windows that use the Legacy style of argument passing.

  • PSExec - Adds the new Switch-Process cmdlet (alias exec) to provide exec compatibility for non-Windows systems.

    PowerShell 7.3.1 changed the exec alias to a function that wraps Switch-Process. The function allows you to pass parameters to the native command that might have erroneously bound to the WithCommand parameter.

PowerShell 7.3 introduces the following experimental features:

PowerShell 7.3 removed the following experimental features:

  • PSNativePSPathResolution experimental feature is no longer supported.
  • PSStrictModeAssignment experimental feature is no longer supported.

For more information about the Experimental Features, see Using Experimental Features.