PowerShell ... with buttons - Andrew Pla, Stephen Valdinger - PSConfEU 2026

PowerShell Conference EU June 1-4, 2026 Dorint Pallas Wiesbaden https://github.com/psconfeu/2026 (slides, code) This session was recorded at the 2026 European PowerShell Conference. In this talk, Stephen Valdinger and Andrew Pla discuss how PowerShell Universal can be used to add a web interface to existing PowerShell code, with the goal of making tools accessible to people who are not PowerShell developers. They explain that the general idea is to wrap familiar PowerShell parameters and commands in forms, buttons and other UI components. They begin by mapping common parameter types to interface elements. String parameters can become text boxes, validate sets can become dropdowns or radio groups, integers can become sliders or numeric inputs, and date-time values can use date pickers. They also mention checkboxes for switch parameters and note that the same PowerShell concepts can be presented in a more user-friendly way. The presenters then show how PowerShell Universal apps, endpoints and automation scripts fit together. The app provides the web interface, endpoints expose a REST layer, and the underlying PowerShell module performs the actual work against a SQLite database. They describe this as a separation between presentation and data, so the app does not talk directly to the database. A large part of the session is a demo using a PowerShell Podcast submission app. The app allows users to submit topics, manage episodes, view recent submissions and update status. They also demonstrate dynamic regions that refresh parts of the page, toast notifications, query-string filtering, and a protected admin view. Later, they cover file uploads, downloads, testing and packaging. They show how upload components can accept files, how Pester tests can cover the module, endpoints and UI, and how Playwright can test the app in a browser. Finally, they present a Plaster-based template that scaffolds a PowerShell Universal module, and they note that tagged modules can appear in the PowerShell Universal gallery for easier discovery. Chapters: 00:00:00 PowerShell…..with buttons - Andrew Pla,Stephen Valdinger - PSConfEU 2026 00:00:17 PowerShell With Buttons 00:01:54 Parameters Become Components 00:04:50 Dropdowns and Sliders 00:07:11 Helpful PSU Resources 00:08:42 Building the Podcast Module 00:13:01 Updating Submission Status 00:14:52 Exploring PowerShell Universal 00:16:12 APIs, Scripts, and Apps 00:21:27 Forms and Dynamic UIs 00:27:36 Modules and Universal Folders 00:31:43 Separating Data Layers 00:34:33 App Security and Auth 00:36:39 Live Topic Submission Demo 00:40:58 App-Data Separation Explained 00:43:00 Endpoint Design Patterns 00:50:07 Questions and Clarifications 00:56:17 File Uploads in Apps 01:00:50 Testing PSU Apps 01:09:24 Plaster Template Scaffold 01:14:03 Gallery Discovery and Tags 01:16:11 Generic App Templates 01:20:03 Real-World PSU Projects 01:22:43 Environments and Secrets