Minimize all windows on remote computer using PowerShell

Question

Minimize all windows on remote computer using PowerShell

Tom Sasson 1

Hi, I am trying to connect remotely to a machine using SSH and executing PowerShell command to minimize all windows on the remote computer.

I am using Python, and SSH protocol of paramiko package.

Usually PowerShell commands do work for me, except for this one.

This is what I was trying, and works locally but not remotely:

ssh_client.execute_command('powershell -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -command "& { $x = New-Object -ComObject Shell.Application; $x.minimizeall() }"')

Could anyone suggest what is wrong, or perhaps another solution to minimize all windows?

2 answers

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Answer 1

MotoX80 36,291

That call will not "minimize all windows on the remote computer", it will minimize all windows that were launched by the interactive desktop shell for the user who executes the call. An SSH session is launched by the OpenSSH service, not a desktop shell. I don't think that's going to work for you.

You could try using the task scheduler and create a task that executes Powershell and your script. Set the task to run as the use "INTERACTIVE". Then on the local PC run "schtasks /run /s remote-pc-name /tn Your-Task-Name". The desktop user will see a Powershell window pop up when that runs.

Tom Sasson 1 Reputation point

2020-09-23T10:22:36.807+00:00

Thanks for that.
So if I'm connecting from Linux, there is no possible way to achieve that goal?
MotoX80 36,291 Reputation points

2020-09-23T17:55:30.763+00:00

Linux has nothing to do with it. You are using a shell call that to the best of my knowledge has to be executed in the context of the user that you want it to be applied to. It is not a machine wide call. On a Win10 machine one user can logon and then disconnnect and a second use can then log on. Which users' windows do you want minimized?

You could try the scheduled task method as I described. Another thought that I had was to write a system tray program that would run as part of the users desktop environment and have it execute the call. I'm not sure what the best way to trigger it to do that would be. You would likely need to ask that question in a developer forum.

What is the real problem that you are trying to accomplish? That is, why do you want to minimize all windows? Is this for a single user Win10 machine? A multi user server machine? Won't the user wonder why his desktop apps seem to disappear when you run that?
Tom Sasson 1 Reputation point

2020-09-24T05:06:10.637+00:00

Thank you for your kind answer.
In the end, I dropped down this idea and found a bypass using win32 commands on the remote machine to locate the window I wanted and maximize it.

Basically, I am running long tests on remote machines and wanted to show an image on the screen that a test is running, so not to touch anything.
All my attempts to keep this window on top and maximized were in vain, so I tried the approach of minimizing all other windows before I load the image.

As I said, I found a solution using direct win32 API usage.

Answer 2

Rich Matheisen 47,901

See if your Linux distribution is supported. If so, install it on the Linux machine and use it (pretty much) the same way you would on Windows. There are some things that you can't do but New-PSSession and Invoke-Command (for example) are usable.

installing-powershell-core-on-linux

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Minimize all windows on remote computer using PowerShell

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