برچسب: PowerShell

how I automated my blogging workflow with GitHub, PowerShell, and Azure | Code4IT
After 100 articles, I’ve found some neat ways to automate my blogging workflow. I will share my experience and the tools I use from the very beginning to the very end.

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Just a second! 🫷
If you are here, it means that you are a software developer.
So, you know that storage, networking, and domain management have a cost .

If you want to support this blog, please ensure that you have disabled the adblocker for this site.
I configured Google AdSense to show as few ADS as possible – I don’t want to bother you with lots of ads, but I still need to add some to pay for the resources for my site.

Thank you for your understanding.
– Davide

This is my 100th article 🥳 To celebrate it, I want to share with you the full process I use for writing and publishing articles.

In this article I will share all the automation and tools I use for writing, starting from the moment an idea for an article pops up in my mind to what happens weeks after an article has been published.

I hope to give you some ideas to speed up your publishing process. Of course, I’m open to suggestions to improve my own flow: perhaps (well, certainly), you use better tools and processes, so feel free to share them.

Introducing my blog architecture

To better understand what’s going on, I need a very brief overview of the architecture of my blog.

It is written in Gatsby, a framework based on ReactJS that, in short, allows you to transform Markdown files into blog posts (it does many other things, but they are not important for the purpose of this article).

So, all my blog is stored in a private GitHub repository. Every time I push some changes on the master branch, a new deployment is triggered, and I can see my changes in a bunch of minutes on my blog.

As I said, I use Gatsby. But the key point here is that my blog is stored in a GitHub repo: this means that everything you’ll read here is valid for any Headless CMS based on Git, such as Gatsby, Hugo, NextJS, and Jekyll.

Now that you know some general aspects, it’s time to deep dive into my writing process.

Before writing: organizing ideas with GitHub

My central source, as you might have already understood, is GitHub.

There, I write all my notes and keep track of the status of my articles.

Everything is quite well organized, and with the support of some automation, I can speed up my publishing process.

Github Projects to track the status of the articles

GitHub Projects are the parts of GitHub that allow you to organize GitHub Issues to track their status.

I’ve created 2 GitHub Projects: one for the main articles (like this one), and one for my C# and Clean Code Tips.

In this way, I can use different columns and have more flexibility when handling the status of the tasks.

GitHub issues templates

As I said, to write my notes I use GitHub issues.

When I add a new Issue, the first thing is to define which type of article I want to write. And, since sometimes many weeks or months pass between when I came up with the idea for an article and when I start writing it, I need to organize my ideas in a structured way.

To do that, I use GitHub templates. When I create a new Issue, I choose which kind of article I’m going to write.

Based on the layout, I can add different info. For instance, when I want to write a new “main” article, I see this form

which is prepopulated with some fields:
- Title: with a placeholder ([Article] )
- Content: with some sections (the titles, translated from Italian, mean Topics, Links, General notes)
- Labels: I automatically assign the Article label to the issue (you’ll see later why I do that)
How can you create GitHub issue templates? All you need is a Markdown file under the .github/ISSUE_TEMPLATE folder with content similar to this one.
--- name: New article about: New blog article title: "[Article] - " labels: Article assignees: bellons91 --- ## Argomenti ## Link ## Appunti vari
And you’re good to go!

GitHub action to assign issues to a project

Now I have GitHub Projects and different GitHub Issues Templates. How can I join the different parts? Well, with GitHub Actions!

With GitHub Actions, you can automate almost everything that happens in GitHub (and outside) using YAML files.

So, here’s mine:

For better readability, you can find the Gist here.

This action looks for opened and labeled issues and pull requests, and based on the value of the label it assigns the element to the correct project.

In this way, after I choose a template, filled the fields, and added additional labels (like C#, Docker, and so on), I can see my newly created issue directly in the Articles board. Neat 😎

Writing

Now it’s the time of writing!

As I said, I’m using Gatsby, so all my articles are stored in a GitHub repository and written in Markdown.

For every article I write, I use a separate git branch: in this way, I’m free to update the content already online (in case of a typo) without publishing my drafts.

But, of course, I automated it! 😎

Powershell script to scaffold a new article

Every article lives in its /content/posts/{year}/{folder-name}/article.md file. And they all have a cover image in a file named cover.png.

Also, every MD file begins with a Frontmatter section, like this:
--- title: "How I automated my publishing flow with Gatsby, GitHub, PowerShell and Azure" path: "/blog/automate-articles-creations-github-powershell-azure" tags: ["MainArticle"] featuredImage: "./cover.png" excerpt: "a description for 072-how-i-create-articles" created: 4219-11-20 updated: 4219-11-20 ---
But, you know, I was tired of creating everything from scratch. So I wrote a Powershell Script to do everything for me.

You can find the code in this Gist.

This script performs several actions:
1. Switches to the Master branch and downloads the latest updates
2. Asks for the article slug that will be used to create the folder name
3. Creates a new branch using the article slug as a name
4. Creates a new folder that will contain all the files I will be using for my article (markdown content and images)
5. Creates the article file with the Frontmatter part populated with dummy values
6. Copies a placeholder image into this folder; this image will be the temporary cover image
In this way, with a single command, I can scaffold a new article with all the files I need to get started.

Ok, but how can I run a PowerShell in a Gatsby repository?

I added this script in the package.json file
```
"create-article": "@powershell -NoProfile -ExecutionPolicy Unrestricted -Command ./article-creator.ps1",
```
where article-creator.ps1 is the name of the file that contains the script.

Now I can simply run npm run create-article to have a new empty article in a new branch, already updated with everything published in the Master branch.

Markdown preview on VS Code

I use Visual Studio Code to write my articles: I like it because it’s quite fast and with lots of functionalities to write in Markdown (you can pick your favorites in the Extensions store).

One of my favorites is the Preview on Side. To see the result of your MarkDown on a side panel, press CTRL+SHIFT+P and select Open Preview to the Side.

Here’s what I can see right now while I’m writing:

Grammar check with Grammarly

Then, it’s time for a check on the Grammar. I use Grammarly, which helps me fix lots of errors (well, in the last time, only a few: it means I’ve improved a lot! 😎).

I copy the Markdown in their online editor, fix the issues, and copy it back into my repo.

Fun fact: the online editor recognizes that you’re using Markdown and automatically checks only the actual text, ignoring all the symbols you use in Markdown (like brackets).

Unprofessional, but fun, cover images

One of the tasks I like the most is creating my cover images.

I don’t use stock images, I prefer using less professional but more original cover images.

You can see all of them here.

Creating and scheduling PR on GitHub with Templates and Actions

Now that my article is complete, I can set it as ready for being scheduled.

To do that, I open a Pull Request to the Master Branch, and, again, add some kind of automation!

I have created a PR template in an MD file, which I use to create a draft of the PR content.

In this way, I can define which task (so, which article) is related to this PR, using the “Closes” formula (“Closes #111174” means that I’m closing the Issue with ID 111174).

Also, I can define when this PR will be merged on Master, using the /schedule tag.

It works because I have integrated into my workflow a GitHub Action, merge-schedule, that reads the date from that field to understand when the PR must be merged.

So, every Tuesday at 8 AM, this action runs to check if there are any PRs that can be merged. If so, the PR will be merged into master, and the CI/CD pipeline builds the site and publishes the new content.

As usual, you can find the code of this action here

After the PR is merged, I also receive an email that notifies me of the action.

After publishing

Once a new article is online, I like to give it some visibility.

To do that, I heavily rely on Azure Logic Apps.

Azure Logic App for sharing on Twitter

My blog exposes an RSS feed. And, obviously, when a new article is created, a new item appears in the feed.

I use it to trigger an Azure Logic App to publish a message on Twitter:

The Logic App reads the newly published feed item and uses its metadata to create a message that will be shared on Twitter.

If you prefer, you can use a custom Azure Function! The choice is yours!

Cross-post reminder with Azure Logic Apps

Similarly, I use an Azure Logic App to send to myself an email to remind me to cross-post my articles to other platforms.

I’ve added a delay so that my content lives longer, and I can repost it even after weeks or months.

Unluckily, when I cross-post my articles I have to do it manually, This is quite a time-consuming especially when there are lots of images: in my MD files I use relative paths, so when porting my content to different platforms I have to find the absolute URL for my images.

And, my friends, this is everything that happens in the background of my blog!

What I’m still missing

I’ve added a lot of effort to my blog, and I’m incredibly proud of it!

But still, there are a few things I’d like to improve.

SEO Tools/analysis

I’ve never considered SEO. Or, better, Keywords.

I write for the sake of writing, and because I love it. And I don’t like to stuff my content with keywords just to rank better on search engines.

I take care of everything like alt texts, well-structured sections, and everything else. But I’m not able to follow the “rules” to find the best keywords.

Maybe I should use some SEO tools to find the best keywords for me. But I don’t want to bend to that way of creating content.

Also, I should spend more time thinking of the correct title and section titles.

Any idea?

Easy upgrade of Gatsby/Migrate to other headless CMSs

Lastly, I’d like to find another theme or platform and leave the one I’m currently using.

Not because I don’t like it. But because many dependencies are outdated, and the theme I’m using hasn’t been updated since 2019.

Wrapping up

That’s it: in this article, I’ve explained everything that I do when writing a blog post.

Feel free to take inspiration from my automation to improve your own workflow, and contact me if you have some nice improvements or ideas: I’m all ears!

So, for now, happy coding!

🐧
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آگوست 21, 2025
OhMyPosh and CascadiaCode not working on PowerShell? How to fix it in Windows 10 and Windows 11 Integrated Terminal | Code4IT
Learn how to integrate Oh My Posh, a cross-platform tool that lets you create beautiful and informative prompts for PowerShell.

Table of Contents

Just a second! 🫷
If you are here, it means that you are a software developer.
So, you know that storage, networking, and domain management have a cost .

If you want to support this blog, please ensure that you have disabled the adblocker for this site.
I configured Google AdSense to show as few ADS as possible – I don’t want to bother you with lots of ads, but I still need to add some to pay for the resources for my site.

Thank you for your understanding.
– Davide

The content of the blog you are reading right now is stored in a Git repository. Every time I create an article, I create a new Git Branch to isolate the changes.

To generate the skeleton of the articles, I use the command line (well, I generally use PowerShell); in particular, given that I’m using both Windows 10 and Windows 11 – depending on the laptop I’m working on – I use the Integrated Terminal, which allows you to define the style, the fonts, and so on of every terminal configured in the settings.

The default profile is pretty basic: no info is shown except for the current path – I want to customize the appearance.

I want to show the status of the Git repository, including:
- repository name
- branch name
- outgoing commits
There are lots of articles that teach how to use OhMyPosh with Cascadia Code. Unfortunately, I couldn’t make them work.

In this article, I teach you how I fixed it on my local machine. It’s a step-by-step guide I wrote while installing it on my local machine. I hope it works for you as well!

Step 1: Create the $PROFILE file if it does not exist

In PowerShell, you can customize the current execution by updating the $PROFILE file.

Clearly, you first have to check if the profile file exists.

Open the PowerShell and type:
$PROFILE # You can also use $profile lowercase - it's the same!
This command shows you the expected path of this file. The file, if it exists, is stored in that location.

In this case, the $Profile file should be available under the folder C:\Users\d.bellone\Documents\WindowsPowerShell. In my case, it does not exist, though!

Therefore, you must create it manually: head to that folder and create a file named Microsoft.PowerShell_profile.ps1.

Note: it might happen that not even the WindowsPowerShell folder exists. If it’s missing, well, create it!

Step 2: Install OhMyPosh using Winget, Scoop, or PowerShell

To use OhMyPosh, we have to – of course – install it.

As explained in the official documentation, we have three ways to install OhMyPosh, depending on the tool you prefer.

If you use Winget, just run:
winget install JanDeDobbeleer.OhMyPosh -s winget
If you prefer Scoop, the command is:
scoop install https://github.com/JanDeDobbeleer/oh-my-posh/releases/latest/download/oh-my-posh.json
And, if you like working with PowerShell, execute:
Set-ExecutionPolicy Bypass -Scope Process -Force; Invoke-Expression ((New-Object System.Net.WebClient).DownloadString('https://ohmyposh.dev/install.ps1'))
I used Winget, and you can see the installation process here:

Now, to apply these changes, you have to restart the PowerShell.

Step 3: Add OhMyPosh to the PowerShell profile

Open the Microsoft.PowerShell_profile.ps1 file and add the following line:
oh-my-posh init pwsh | Invoke-Expression
This command is executed every time you open the PowerShell with the default profile, and it initializes OhMyPosh to have it available during the current session.

Now, you can save and close the file.

Hint: you can open the profile file with Notepad by running notepad $PROFILE.

Step 4: Set the Execution Policy to RemoteSigned

Restart the terminal. In all probability, you will see an error like this:

The error message

The file <path>\Microsoft.PowerShell_profile.ps1 is
not digitally signed. You cannot run this script on the current system

means that PowerShell does not trust the script it’s trying to load.

To see which Execution Policy is currently active, run:

You’ll probably see that the value is AllSigned.

To enable the execution of scripts created on your local machine, you have to set the Execution Policy value to RemoteSigned, using this command by running the PowerShell in administrator mode:
Set-ExecutionPolicy RemoteSigned
Let’s see the definition of the RemoteSigned Execution policy as per SQLShack’s article:

This is also a safe PowerShell Execution policy to set in an enterprise environment. This policy dictates that any script that was not created on the system that the script is running on, should be signed. Therefore, this will allow you to write your own script and execute it.

So, yeah, feel free to proceed and set the new Execution policy to have your PowerShell profile loaded correctly every time you open a new PowerShell instance.

Now, OhMyPosh can run in the current profile.

Head to a Git repository and notice that… It’s not working!🤬 Or, well, we have the Git information, but we are missing some icons and glyphs.

Step 5: Use CaskaydiaCove, not Cascadia Code, as a font

We still have to install the correct font with the missing icons.

We will install it using Chocolatey, a package manager available for Windows 11.

To check if you have it installed, run:

Now, to install the correct font family, open a PowerShell with administration privileges and run:
choco install cascadia-code-nerd-font
Once the installation is complete, you must tell Integrated Terminal to use the correct font by following these steps:
1. open to the Settings page (by hitting CTRL + ,)
2. select the profile you want to update (in my case, I’ll update the default profile)
3. open the Appearance section
4. under Font face select CaskaydiaCove Nerd Font
Now close the Integrated Terminal to apply the changes.

Open it again, navigate to a Git repository, and admire the result.

Further readings

The first time I read about OhMyPosh, it was on Scott Hanselman’s blog. I couldn’t make his solution work – and that’s the reason I wrote this article. However, in his article, he shows how he customized his own Terminal with more glyphs and icons, so you should give it a read.

🔗 My Ultimate PowerShell prompt with Oh My Posh and the Windows Terminal | Scott Hanselman’s blog

We customized our PowerShell profile with just one simple configuration. However, you can do a lot more. You can read Ruud’s in-depth article about PowerShell profiles.

🔗 How to Create a PowerShell Profile – Step-by-Step | Lazyadmin

One of the core parts of this article is that we have to use CaskaydiaCove as a font instead of the (in)famous Cascadia Code. But why?

🔗 Why CaskaydiaCove and not Cascadia Code? | GitHub

Finally, as I said at the beginning of this article, I use Git and Git Branches to handle the creation and management of my blog articles. That’s just the tip of the iceberg! 🏔️

If you want to steal my (previous) workflow, have a look at the behind-the-scenes of my blogging process (note: in the meanwhile, a lot of things have changed, but these steps can still be helpful for you)

🔗 From idea to publishing, and beyond: how I automated my blogging workflow with GitHub, PowerShell, and Azure | Code4IT

This article first appeared on Code4IT 🐧

Wrapping up

In this article, we learned how to install OhMyPosh in PowerShell and overcome all the errors you (well, I) don’t see described in other articles.

I wrote this step-by-step article alongside installing these tools on my local machine, so I’m confident the solution will work.

Did this solution work for you? Let me know! 📨

I hope you enjoyed this article! Let’s keep in touch on Twitter or LinkedIn! 🤜🤛

Happy coding!

🐧
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جولای 12, 2025
GitHub Copilot for CLI for PowerShell
GitHub Next has this cool project that is basically Copilot for the CLI (command line interface). You can sign up for their waitlist at the Copilot for CLI site.

Copilot for CLI provides three shell commands: ??, git? and gh?

This is cool and all, but I use PowerShell. Turns out these ?? commands are just router commands to a larger EXE called github-copilot-cli. So if you go “?? something” you’re really going “github-copilot-cli what-the-shell something.”

So this means I should be able to to do the same/similar aliases for my PowerShell prompt AND change the injected prompt (look at me I’m a prompt engineer) to add ‘use powershell to.’

Now it’s not perfect, but hopefully it will make the point to the Copilot CLI team that PowerShell needs love also.

Here are my aliases. Feel free to suggest if these suck. Note the addition of “user powershell to” for the ?? one. I may make a ?? and a p? where one does bash and one does PowerShell. I could also have it use wsl.exe and shell out to bash. Lots of possibilities.
```
function ?? { 
$TmpFile = New-TemporaryFile 
github-copilot-cli what-the-shell ('use powershell to ' + $args) --shellout $TmpFile 
if ([System.IO.File]::Exists($TmpFile)) { 
$TmpFileContents = Get-Content $TmpFile 
if ($TmpFileContents -ne $nill) {
Invoke-Expression $TmpFileContents 
Remove-Item $TmpFile 
}
}
}function git? {
$TmpFile = New-TemporaryFile
github-copilot-cli git-assist $args --shellout $TmpFile
if ([System.IO.File]::Exists($TmpFile)) {
$TmpFileContents = Get-Content $TmpFile 
if ($TmpFileContents -ne $nill) {
Invoke-Expression $TmpFileContents 
Remove-Item $TmpFile 
}
}
}
function gh? {
$TmpFile = New-TemporaryFile
github-copilot-cli gh-assist $args --shellout $TmpFile
if ([System.IO.File]::Exists($TmpFile)) {
$TmpFileContents = Get-Content $TmpFile 
if ($TmpFileContents -ne $nill) {
Invoke-Expression $TmpFileContents 
Remove-Item $TmpFile 
}
}
} 
```
It also then offers to run the command. Very smooth.

Hope you like it. Lots of fun stuff happening in this space.

About Scott

Scott Hanselman is a former professor, former Chief Architect in finance, now speaker, consultant, father, diabetic, and Microsoft employee. He is a failed stand-up comic, a cornrower, and a book author.

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آوریل 17, 2025