Getting Help (man)

Command Equivalents

Description

The Get-Help cmdlet is arguably the most important command to learn in PowerShell. It is your built-in guide to every other command, function, and concept in the shell. Using Get-Help effectively is the key to discovering new commands and understanding how to use them without having to search the web.

First-Time Use: Update-Help

PowerShell’s help files are not always shipped with the operating system and can become outdated. To ensure you have the latest information, you should run the Update-Help cmdlet.

You must run this command from a PowerShell session with Administrator privileges.

# Run this in an Administrator PowerShell window
Update-Help

You only need to do this once, and then perhaps every few months to refresh the content.

Common Usage

Getting Help for a Cmdlet

To get the main help page for any command, simply provide its name.

# Get help for the Get-Process cmdlet
Get-Help Get-Process

# Using the man alias is common for Linux users
man Get-Process

Viewing Practical Examples (-Examples)

Often, the fastest way to learn a command is to see it in action. The -Examples parameter shows several practical, real-world examples of how the command is used.

# Show only the usage examples for Copy-Item
Get-Help Copy-Item -Examples

Viewing Full Detailed Help (-Full)

To see every piece of information about a cmdlet—including a detailed description of every parameter, its data type, and default values—use the -Full switch.

# Get the complete, detailed help file for Stop-Process
Get-Help Stop-Process -Full

Opening Help in a Web Browser (-Online)

For the most current and often better-formatted version of a help file, use the -Online parameter. This will open the official Microsoft documentation for the command in your default web browser.

# Open the official documentation page for Select-String
Get-Help Select-String -Online

Getting Help on PowerShell Concepts

Get-Help can also retrieve conceptual “About” topics. These are detailed explanations of core PowerShell concepts.

# Get information about PowerShell's execution policies
Get-Help about_Execution_Policies