Using the Get-Date Cmdlet
Listing Date and Time Information
As you might expect, the Get-Date cmdlet enables you to retrieve the current date and time. As you might also expect, there are a few other interesting tricks you can do with Get-Date, some of which we’ll show you momentarily.
Let’s start with the simplest scenario first. If all you want is the current date and time then simply call Get-Date without any additional parameters:
Get-Date
In return, you’ll get back something similar to this:
Wed May 10 10:07:25 2006
Ah, but suppose you want only the date, not the date and the time? Then just use the -displayhint parameter and specify date:
Get-Date -displayhint date
Or, if you’d prefer just the time:
Get-Date -displayhint time
You can also use Get-Date to create a date-time object for any date/time. For example, this command creates a variable named $A that maps to 12:00 AM on May 1, 2006:
$A = Get-Date 5/1/2006
What’s that? You need to map $A to 7:00 AM on May 1, 2006? Why not:
$A = Get-Date "5/1/2006 7:00 AM"
Get-Date also includes a number of methods for doing some handy-dandy date arithmetic:
AddSeconds
AddMinutes
AddHours
AddDays
AddMonths
AddYears
Need to know the date/time 137 minutes from now? This command will show you:
(Get-Date).AddMinutes(137)