change time zone for all computers in an ou with powershell

Here’s a little PowerShell script you can use to change the time zone for all computers in a certain OU.

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Import-Module ActiveDirectory

$cred = Get-Credential

$arr = Get-ADComputer -SearchBase ‘OU=Servers,OU=example,dc=blah,dc=com’ -Filter ‘*’ | Select-Object -ExpandProperty Name

#for debugging - manually set the array for testing

#$arr = “server01”, “server02”

foreach ($a in $arr)

{

Write $a

Write “current time zone is”

invoke-command -cn $a -cred $cred {tzutil /g}

Write “———————”

Write “overwriting time zone”

invoke-command -cn $a -cred $cred {tzutil /s “Central Standard Time”}

Write “———————”

}

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add users to a group based on an ad attribute

Props to TechNet forums user philldogger for this one.  If you want to build a group in AD based on the value of an attribute that the users will have (e.g. make a DFS group based on Department) you can do this:

Import-Module ActiveDirectory

Get-ADUser -filter{department -like “Accounting”} | %{Add-ADGroupMember dfs_dept_Accounting $_.SamAccountName}

In this example I am specifying the “department” AD attribute and looking for anyone who’s Department is set to “Accounting” and adding them to my AD group named “dfs_dept_Accounting”.  

If you want to script it so the group membership is updated as new people join, add this line below the importing of the AD PowerShell module.

Get-ADGroupMember dfs_dept_Accounting | %{remove-adgroupmember dfs_dept_Accounting $_.SamAccountName -Confirm:$false}

This will wipe out the group and then re-add everyone.  You can have one script per group you’d like to be updated, or combine multiple into one script.  Fair warning though, if you have a good sized AD the script’s could take a long time to run and may hammer your DC’s so do due diligence.