Are you tired of entering the system tag information by hand on Dell’s support web site?  You want a fast and easy way to automate Dell support with PowerShell.  I’ll show you how to Automate Dell Support With PowerShell in this life changing series!

This week, we’re learning how to open Dell’s support site with the system tag filled in automatically.

If you previously read my post on getting the Dell System Tag from WMI you may have, like me, come away from it with one big problem.  In the article, I say that you can enter the system tag into Dell’s support page.  That is a little lame, don’t you think?  Audacious, in fact, to suggest that a PowerShell user should have to do anything!

So, with my apologies, here is a very quick improvement to help you get to your Dell Support Page that much faster.

How To Open Dell’s Support Page with the System Tag Already Filled In

function popup-Dellinfo

{
$systemtag = (gwmi win32_bios).serialnumber      

#Thanks to Jeffrey Snover for pointing out the Win32_BIOS class

$ie = new-object -com "InternetExplorer.Application"

$webaddress= [string]::Format("

http://support.dell.com/support/DPP/Index.aspx?c=us&cs=RC956904&l=en&s=hied&ServiceTag={0}",$systemtag)

$ie.Navigate($webaddress)

$ie.visible=$true
}

Drop that function into PowerShell, or add it to your PowerShell profile.

That’s pretty good, but I think it can be better.

To see it go from this rudimentary function to something more robust come back next week.  Or subscribe to this blog and read it the day it comes out in your RSS reader!