3 easy ways to manage Windows applications through command line

Got some new toy? Or just rebooted after installing Windows again? Here are 3 ways to get your applications going again and get rid of those pesky pre-installed apps.

Chocolatey!

The sane way to manage software on Windows

One thing that’s great about Linux, Mac OS, Android and other operating systems is the way applications can be found and updated in 1 central place. 

Chocolatey is your apt-get for Windows. You can simply search for software from within your command line. The package is automatically downloaded, installed without prompts, Yes- and No-buttons and without installing all those toolbars and crapware.

Install Chocolatey

Chocolatey website

Requirements

• Windows 7+ / Windows Server 2003+
• PowerShell v2+
• .NET Framework 4+ (the installation will attempt to install .NET 4.0 if you do not have it installed)

Installation is easy. Just a PowerShell one-liner. Mind, this is a PowerShell script downloaded from a remote source. So, we need to allow this using Set-ExecutionPolicy.

Set-ExecutionPolicy Bypass -Scope Process -Force; 
iex ((New-Object System.Net.WebClient).DownloadString('https://chocolatey.org/install.ps1'))

Install package

choco install <package name>

Update package

Ready installing all applications? Let’s get up-to-date.

choco upgrade <package name>

And now let’s update all of them.

choco upgrade all

Uninstall package

choco uninstall <package name>

Tip: Don’t like confirming every question? Add -fy to the end of each command. This will auto-confirm every prompt.

Windows Optional Features

Every Windows installation comes with built-in features. Some features need to be enabled explicitly. You can do this by using the GUI. But this involves clicking…

Install Optional Features

First we need to find the name of the feature we would like to install.. We can search Technet, Docs, browse the dialog screen in the control panel or use Get-WindowsOptionalFeature to find the appropriate name.

Then we just install the feature using:

Enable-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online -FeatureName <FeatureName>

Uninstall Optional Features

Uninstalling is obvious now…

Disable-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online -FeatureName <FeatureName>

AppxPackage

Do you like Candy Crush? Oh!?! You do? Well… euhm… You could uninstall the built-in Calculator app 🙂

Get-AppxPackage <package name> | Remove-AppxPackage

Here are some examples I use. Cheers!

function Install-Modules{
    ### Downloading and installing PowerShell modules
    Install-Module -Name AzureAD
}

function Install-WindowsOptionalFeatures {
    ### Installing optional Windows Features
    Enable-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online -FeatureName TelnetClient
    Enable-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online -FeatureName Microsoft-Windows-Subsystem-Linux
}

function Install-Choco {
    ### Downloading and installing some Choco
    Invoke-Expression ((New-Object System.Net.WebClient).DownloadString('https://chocolatey.org/install.ps1'))
}

function Install-Programs {
    ################ Office applications
    choco install googlechrome -fy
    choco install firefox -fy
    choco install winrar -fy
    choco install notepadplusplus.install -fy
    choco install vlc -fy
    choco install office365proplus -fy
    choco install microsoft-teams -fy
    choco install vscode -fy
    ## choco install spotify -fy
    choco install sharex -fy
    choco install adobereader -fy
    choco install audacity -fy

    ################ Tooling
    choco install jre8 -fy
    choco install malwarebytes -fy
    choco install python3 -fy

    choco install windirstat -fy
    choco install autoruns -fy
    choco install teamviewer -fy
    choco install rdm -fy
    choco install filezilla -fy
    choco install wireshark -fy
    choco install logmein-rescue-console-desktop -fy
    choco install virtualbox -fy
    choco install curl -fy
    choco install procexp -fy
    choco install speccy -fy
    choco install putty.install -fy
    ## choco install rsat -fy
    choco install intel-xtu -fy
    choco install cinebench -fy
    choco install advanced-ip-scanner -fy
    choco install nmap -fy

    ################ Cloud tooling
    choco install microsoftazurestorageexplorer -fy
    choco install azurepowershell -fy
}