Microsoft has released Microsoft.PowerShell.PlatyPS 1.0.0-Preview1, a new version of the PowerShell help file generating tool that makes the process easier by converting help files to Microsoft Assistance Markup Language (MAML).

The new version includes various enhancements, such as more accurate descriptions of PowerShell cmdlets, improved efficiency, an object model for the help file, and cmdlets for chaining complex processes. The primary goal is to address long-standing issues, introduce schema-driven functionality, and improve validity checks. The new version contains a C# rewrite, a new Markdown schema, new cmdlets, full YAML serialization, automatic conversion of existing Markdown to the new object model, and export to Markdown, Yaml, and MAML.

Announcing Microsoft.PowerShell.PlatyPS 1.0.0-Preview1

We’re pleased to announce the release of  Microsoft.PowerShell.PlatyPS 1.0.0-Preview1. With this release, there are two versions of PlatyPS.

• platyPS v0.14.2 is the current version of PlatyPS that’s used to create PowerShell help files in Markdown format.
• Microsoft.PowerShell.PlatyPS is the new version of PlatyPS that includes several improvements:
  • Provides a more accurate description of a PowerShell cmdlet and its parameters
  • Increased performance – processes 1000s of Markdown files in seconds
  • Creates an object model of the help file that you can manipulate in memory
  • Provides cmdlets that you can chain together to perform complex operations

Our main goal for this release is to address long standing issues, add more schema driven features, and improve validity checking along with performance. This release is a substantial rewrite with all new cmdlets. If you have scripts that use the older version of PlatyPS, you must rewrite them to use the new cmdlets.

In this Preview release, we focused on:

• Re-write in C# leveraging  markdig for parsing Markdown.
• New Markdown schema that includes all elements needed for Get-Help, plus information that was previously unavailable.
• The new cmdlets produce objects, supporting chaining cmdlets for complex operations.
• Full serialization to YAML to support our publishing pipeline.
• Automatic conversion of existing Markdown to the new object model.
• Export of the object model to Markdown, Yaml, and MAML.
• The module contains the following cmdlets:
  • Compare-CommandHelp
  • Export-MamlCommandHelp
  • Export-MarkdownCommandHelp
  • Export-MarkdownModuleFile
  • Export-YamlCommandHelp
  • Export-YamlModuleFile
  • Import-MamlHelp
  • Import-MarkdownCommandHelp
  • Import-MarkdownModuleFile
  • Import-YamlCommandHelp
  • Import-YamlModuleFile
  • New-CommandHelp
  • New-MarkdownCommandHelp
  • New-UpdateableHelp
  • Test-MarkdownCommandHelp
  • Update-CommandHelp
  • Update-MarkdownCommandHelp

Microsoft.PowerShell.PlatyPS runs on:

• Windows PowerShell 5.1+
• PowerShell 7+ on Windows, Linux, and macOS

Announcing Microsoft.PowerShell.PlatyPS 1.0.0-Preview1 - PowerShell Team