From Sysadmin to PowerShell Team: The Story of SeeminglyScience

The PowerShell Podcast

Patrick Meinecke, known as SeeminglyScience, joins host Andrew Pla to share his journey from sysadmin to joining the PowerShell team at Microsoft. He discusses his early community contributions, the inner workings of the PowerShell engine, and powerful but underused features like ETS and type converters. Patrick also highlights helpful modules such as PowerShell Run, ctypes, and Useful Argument Completers, while reflecting on the importance of community engagement and open source collaboration. Key Takeaways:

• From community to Microsoft: Patrick’s contributions to PowerShell Editor Services and GitHub repos helped pave the way for his role on the official PowerShell team.
• Hidden gems in PowerShell: Features like the Extendable Type System (ETS), type converters, and modules such as PowerShell Run, ctypes, and Useful Argument Completers unlock powerful possibilities.
• Community makes it stronger: Helping others, answering questions, and sharing knowledge not only grows the ecosystem but also helps contributors sharpen their own skills.

Guest Bio:
Patrick Meinecke, widely known as SeeminglyScience, is a software engineer on the PowerShell team at Microsoft. Before joining the team, he spent over 15 years in sysadmin and tech support roles and is a longstanding contributor to the PowerShell open-source community. Patrick is recognized for his deep technical expertise in the PowerShell engine, his contributions to PowerShell Editor Services, and his passion for solving complex problems. He remains an active community member, often engaging on Discord and GitHub to help others learn and grow. Resource Links:

• Patrick Meinecke on GitHub (@SeeminglyScience): https://github.com/SeeminglyScience
• Connect with Andrew: https://andrewpla.tech/links
• PowerShell Run (module by MDGRS): https://github.com/nbgrs/PowerShellRun
• Useful Argument Completers (module by MartinGC94): https://github.com/MartinGC94/UsefulArgumentCompleters
• ctypes (module by Jordan Borean): https://github.com/jborean93/PSctypes
• Spectre.Console for PowerShell (community project): https://github.com/PoshCode/PSSpectreConsole
• Join the PDQ Discord: https://discord.gg/pdq
• The PowerShell Podcast on YouTube: https://youtu.be/Zyj1IdZFf1E
• The PowerShell Podcast hub: https://pdq.com/the-powershell-podcast