Powershell: Set a Scheduled Task to run when user isn't logged in

Question

I have been using the Powershell Scheduled Task Cmdlets to create a scheduled task on our servers.

How do I elect to 'Run whether a user is logged in or not using this API?

I've created action, trigger, principal and settings objects, and passed them to Register-ScheduledTask, as below:

$action = New-ScheduledTaskAction -Execute foo.exe -Argument "bar baz"
$trigger = New-ScheduledTaskTrigger -Once -At $startTime -RepetitionInterval (New-TimeSpan -Minutes 1) -RepetitionDuration ([Timespan]::MaxValue)
$principal = New-ScheduledTaskPrincipal -UserId "$($env:USERDOMAIN)\$($env:USERNAME)" -LogonType ServiceAccount
$settings = New-ScheduledTaskSettingsSet -MultipleInstances Parallel

Register-ScheduledTask -TaskName $taskName -TaskPath "\my\path" -Action $action -Trigger $trigger -Settings $settings -Principal $principal

When I create a scheduled task like this, it defaults to 'Run only when the user is logged on.

This question shows how to do so using COM objects, and this one using schtasks.exe, but how do I do it using the *-ScheduledTask* cmdlets?

Answer 1

You need to remove $principal and register the task with a user and password:

Register-ScheduledTask -TaskName $taskname `
                       -TaskPath "\my\path" `
                       -Action $action `
                       -Trigger $trigger `
                       -User "$env:USERDOMAIN\$env:USERNAME" `
                       -Password 'P@ssw0rd' `
                       -Settings $settings

Answer 2

I do not like or approve of the currently highest rated answer as then you have to know your credentials into a script to do this and can't do this from something like Packer or some other system/configuration automation. There is a better/proper way to do this which Aeyoun mentioned but didn't go into details about which is to properly set the principal to run as the system user.

$action = New-ScheduledTaskAction -Execute foo.exe -Argument "bar baz"
$trigger = New-ScheduledTaskTrigger -Once -At (Get-Date) -RepetitionInterval (New-TimeSpan -Minutes 1) -RepetitionDuration ([Timespan]::MaxValue)
$principal = New-ScheduledTaskPrincipal -UserID "NT AUTHORITY\SYSTEM" -LogonType ServiceAccount -RunLevel Highest
$settings = New-ScheduledTaskSettingsSet -MultipleInstances Parallel

Register-ScheduledTask -TaskName "tasknamehere" -TaskPath "\my\path" -Action $action -Trigger $trigger -Settings $settings -Principal $principal

Answer 3

The “Run whether user is logged in or not” option in the Task Scheduler GUI is equivalent to New-ScheduledTaskPrincipal -LogonType S4U.

Answer 4

Once you have the task set up in the gui, run this

$task = Get-ScheduledTask "test task for notepad"
$task.Principal.LogonType = "Password"
Set-ScheduledTask $task

Answer 5

also control Run level check:

RunLevel

Specifies the required privilege level to run tasks that are associated with the principal.

e.g.: "Highest" or "Limited"

Answer 6

I had a similar challenge when trying to create a scheduled task on Powershell to copy files to a mapped drive.

Here's how I solved it:

First, I had to use the UNC path to specify the path of the mapped drive:

Get-ChildItem -Path "C:\MyFiles\*" -Include *.jpg -Recurse | Copy-Item -Destination "\\192.168.54.20\CopiedFiles"

Next, I set up the scheduled job with the commands below:

$TaskName = "FileSync"
$Description = "This task will run periodically to sync .fin files from a specified source directory to a specified destination directory"
$ScriptPath = "C:\Users\my_userDesktop\file_sync.ps1"
$UserAccount = "COMP1\my_user"
$Action = New-ScheduledTaskAction -Execute "PowerShell.exe" -Argument "-ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File $ScriptPath"
$Principal = New-ScheduledTaskPrincipal -UserID $UserAccount -LogonType ServiceAccount
$Trigger = New-ScheduledTaskTrigger -Once -At (Get-Date) -RepetitionInterval (New-TimeSpan -Minutes 1) -RepetitionDuration ([System.TimeSpan]::MaxValue)
Register-ScheduledTask -TaskName $TaskName -Action $Action -Description $Description -Trigger $Trigger -Principal $Principal

Note: The $Principal to allow the task to run whether the user is logged in or not is very essential for a scheduled job that is to sync to a mapped drive.

That's all.

I hope this helps