I recently began working on trying to figure out ways to troubleshoot real problems with a VBScript and give me some diagnostic information about the current state of the environment. As I build this script I plan on sharing pieces of it bit by bit with you, my readers. I also wanted to get back to writing some WMI scripts that will help you all do your jobs more efficiently. Lastly, I wanted to begin building a “toolbox” script that you could use to write your own scripts. These are the goals I’m tracking toward in my next series of posts that contain VBScript code. Now onto this script…

The first piece of troubleshooting a problem, in my opinion, is ensuring that a communication path exists between two systems. Duh! However, simply pinging the systems individually from your desktop isn’t a good test… it only tests the your computer can communicate with the two systems, not that they can communicate with each other!

This script simply uses our friend WMI to make a call a remote computer requesting that computer ping another computer. Simple enough, but invaluable because how many times have you had to login to a remote computer to check if it can connect to a system? Now you don’t have to… you can do it from a script!

The script uses the Win32_PingStatus class in WMI. Essentially, it will only work on Windows XP and newer (Sorry, Windows 2000 and older doesn’t support the WMI class we need.) and the user executing the script will likely need to be an administrator on the system that is being called (but not necessarily being pinged). For further information on this class you can reference the Win32_PingStatus documentation.

I've been writing lately on individual topics and thought it was time for a little fun, while introducing you to a new object in the process... the Scripting.Dictionary object! (and random number generation in the process)

The Scripting.Dictionary object is a quite useful object. It will let you store data in a categorized manner through it's use of a key when you add data to the object. It works very much like a multi-dimensional array would, except that it is much easier to retrieve a specific type of data.

You place the data into the object via the .add method and retrieve a specific item via it's key. The key can either be numeric or a string. In the example below, I've chosen a number. Now for the example... a script so useful that I'm certain it will become a key part of your decision making process at work... The Magic Eight Ball! Now, before you laugh not everyone has a magic eight ball (I have two) and that's a shame because they really do help with making decisions.

Just run the script below several times and ask it these questions:

Will anyone notice if I reboot the exchange server now?
Will the network survive while the Network Guys upgrade the switches?
Will the servers survive another patch Tuesday?
Does my boss appreciate me enough to give me a $10,000 raise?

Last time I posted I gave you a function that provided A simple way to read the registry with VBScript, in this posting we’ll use the same Wscript.shell object as last time, just use a different method– the RegWrite Method!

Keep in mind, writing to the registry can be dangerous to the stability of your system. If you do not specifically know you need to write the registry location, and with what value, I recommend not writing to the registry. I have used a made up registry location so running this script should be as safe as I can make it.

This example writes to HKey_Current_User\VBScriptAdmin the key Teststring, which is a REG_SZ (or string) value. You’ll notice that this value likely doesn’t exist before you run the script. The method creates the entire path if it doesn’t exist– which is very nice! (Or not so nice if you typo the path.)

At the end of the script you should see the ReadReg function reads the value back in and writes the value read, which should be Success!.