PowerShell: Profile (init file)

What is PowerShell Profile

PowerShell profile are files PowerShell loads when starting up. It can contain your own functions, alias, or other customization.

Profile Location

Current user, Current Host

$Home\Documents\PowerShell\Microsoft.PowerShell_profile.ps1

this is the most relevant to user.

Just create the file, and add Function or Alias or other PowerShell code to the file.

e.g. PowerShell: Color Prompt

Current User, All Hosts

$Home\Documents\PowerShell\Profile.ps1

All Users, Current Host

$PSHOME\Microsoft.PowerShell_profile.ps1

All Users, All Hosts

$PSHOME\Profile.ps1

Profile Path Variable

$profile is an Automatic Variables that stores Profile paths.

$profile
# C:\Users\xah\Documents\PowerShell\Microsoft.PowerShell_profile.ps1

Note that even if this file does not exist, it still returns the path.

$profile is actually an object with many properties.

$profile | Get-Member -Type NoteProperty | Format-List

# TypeName   : System.String
# Name       : AllUsersAllHosts
# MemberType : NoteProperty
# Definition : string AllUsersAllHosts=C:\Program Files\PowerShell\7\profile.ps1

# TypeName   : System.String
# Name       : AllUsersCurrentHost
# MemberType : NoteProperty
# Definition : string AllUsersCurrentHost=C:\Program Files\PowerShell\7\Microsoft.PowerShell_profile.ps1

# TypeName   : System.String
# Name       : CurrentUserAllHosts
# MemberType : NoteProperty
# Definition : string CurrentUserAllHosts=C:\Users\xah\Documents\PowerShell\profile.ps1

# TypeName   : System.String
# Name       : CurrentUserCurrentHost
# MemberType : NoteProperty
# Definition : string CurrentUserCurrentHost=C:\Users\xah\Documents\PowerShell\Microsoft.PowerShell_profile.ps1

Start PowerShell Without Loading Profile

pwsh -NoProfile

Show PowerShell Command-Line Options

pwsh -h

or

pwsh -?