Diving into PowerShell: Disable-PSWSManCombinedTrace

Welcome back to Wahmans PowerShell Blog! Today, we’re taking a closer look at an often overlooked cmdlet in the PowerShell toolkit — Disable-PSWSManCombinedTrace.

What does Disable-PSWSManCombinedTrace do?

According to Microsoft’s documentation, Disable-PSWSManCombinedTrace is used to stop a WS-Management logging session that was initiated by the Enable-PSWSManCombinedTrace cmdlet. This logging allows administrators and developers to troubleshoot and audit PowerShell remoting and WS-Man interactions. Turning off tracing after troubleshooting is a great habit to conserve system resources and protect potentially sensitive log data.

Why use it?

Once you’ve gathered the data you need using Enable-PSWSManCombinedTrace, it’s important to disable the trace to stop unnecessary data collection and return the system to its standard operational state. Today, we’ll go over four examples of how to use Disable-PSWSManCombinedTrace, growing in complexity and real-world applicability.

Example 1: Basic Usage

If you have previously enabled the trace and want to stop it, simply run:

Disable-PSWSManCombinedTrace

This will disable all related WS-Management logging sessions without any additional parameters.

Example 2: Run After Troubleshooting Remoting Issues

Let’s say you were troubleshooting remoting issues with:

Enable-PSWSManCombinedTrace

Once your issue is resolved, you can stop tracing with:

Disable-PSWSManCombinedTrace

This ensures that unnecessary logs are no longer being generated, keeping your system clean and efficient.

Example 3: Use in a Script to Reset State Post-Debug

Suppose you’re writing a debug script and want to ensure tracing is turned off once everything runs successfully. You might include:

# Start tracing
Enable-PSWSManCombinedTrace

# Perform tasks or simulate debugging
Start-Sleep -Seconds 10

# Stop tracing
Disable-PSWSManCombinedTrace

This makes sure you’re not leaving tracing on accidentally, which can clutter logs or raise security concerns.

Example 4: Conditional Tracing in an Advanced Script

In a more complex script, you might want to conditionally stop tracing. For example:

$TracingEnabled = $true

try {
    if ($TracingEnabled) {
        Enable-PSWSManCombinedTrace
    }

    # Simulate task
    Invoke-Command -ComputerName Server01 -ScriptBlock { Get-Service }

} catch {
    Write-Warning "An error occurred during remote command execution."
} finally {
    if ($TracingEnabled) {
        Disable-PSWSManCombinedTrace
        Write-Host "Tracing session has been disabled."
    }
}

This is a clean and robust way of managing trace state based on application logic, ensuring trace sessions don’t persist beyond their usefulness.

Final Thoughts

If you’re working with WS-Management or debugging remoting issues in PowerShell, Disable-PSWSManCombinedTrace is a key part of the workflow. Always remember to clean up after enabling any verbose or diagnostic logging.

Happy scripting, and I will see you in the next post!

Wahmans Powershell Blog

Disable-PSWSManCombinedTrace