Invoke-webrequest

Question

Hi All,

I am executing the powershell script Invoke-webrequest for few sharepoint sites.

Among 10 SharePoint sites, 1 sharePoint site gave the output as status code "200" and status description "ok". This is a separate webapplication than the others.

But in other SharePoint sites, the output is "401 - Unauthorized"

However when I added "usedefaultcredentials" i.e the script becomes Invoke-webrequest -usedefaultcredentials, then all the 9 sharePoints are giving output as "ok".

Please let me know why it happens for these 9 sites. how should I make them run successfully giving status code "200" without using "usedefaultcredentials".

Actually the same site is giving 2 different status codes when invoked as webrequest in Powershell. However when I am accessing the site from browser, its asking for the credential.

I am running the below script for the same URL and intermittently it is giving status as "401 Unauthorized" and also sometimes returning as "200 - Ok":

Invoke-webrequest <SiteURL>

Can you please help me with the reason of this intermittent issue for the same site.

Source from TechNet

Answer 1

Hi,

Instead of using UseDefaultCredentials parameter, I suggest you can pass valid credential like this:

$cred = Get-Credential
Invoke-WebRequest -Uri 'https://sp' -Credential $cred

And You can check if the password for the speicific site existed in Windows Credential Manager, maybe the credential is invalid when use UseDefaultCredentials parameter.