How to get a error message back from PowerShell in VBScript

Question

I am running a PowerShell command like this in a VBScript.

Below is the VBScript I am running

'This Script is used for creating Mailboxes for Active Directory Users.
'This script triggers a Power Shell Script which creates the mailbox for the
'ActiveDirectory User.
'
Set args = WScript.Arguments
'Argument 0 contains the identity User Name
WScript.Echo args.Item(0)
'Argument 1 contains the Mail Store Alias Name
WScript.Echo args.Item(1)
'Argument 2 contains the Mail Database
WScript.Echo args.Item(2)
'Argument 3 contains the Report Log Path
WScript.Echo args.Item(3)

On Error Resume Next

Dim shell
Set shell = CreateObject("WScript.Shell")

'Firing the PowerShell command from VBScript
shell.Run "PowerShell.exe -PSConsoleFile ""E:\Program Files\Microsoft\Exchange Server\Bin\exshell.psc1"" -NoExit ""&{""Enable-Mailbox -Identity '"&Replace(args.Item(0),"'", "''")&"' -Alias '"&args.Item(1)&"' -Database '"&args.Item(2)&"';""exit 0""} ",,20

If Err.Number <> 0 Then 
    WScript.Echo("Error Occurred in CreateMailBoxExchange script" & Err.Description)
    WScript.Quit(2)
End If 
WScript.Quit(3)

So when Enable-Mailbox command fails it does not come back with the error message. How should I capture that message and send it back to the user?

try / catch Enable-Mailbox. Return a non-zero exit code when it doesn't work out. Document the meaning of the error codes or just log it. Inspect %LASTEXITCODE%. Or just move everything into PowerShell and get rid of the wrapper :) — Chris Dent
– Chris Dent, Commented Aug 19, 2016 at 13:58

Ansgar Wiechers · Accepted Answer · 2016-08-19 22:55:48Z

Enable-Mailbox doesn't seem to return anything, but it should at least set the automatic variable $?, which indicates whether the last cmdlet was run successfully or not.

You could cast the boolean value of that variable to an integer and return that as the exit code:

Enable-Mailbox ...; exit [int]$?

What you currently have in your PowerShell command string (...; "exit 0") doesn't do anything anyway, since it merely echoes the string "exit 0" without actually setting an exit code (so the default 0 is returned). But even if you removed the double quotes around that statement it would still always return 0.

By setting a proper exit code you can take the numeric value and convert it back to a boolean (0→False, 1→True):

enabled = CBool(shell.Run("...", 0, True))

or just take the numeric value:

exitcode = shell.Run("...", 0, True)

However, for the latter you should invert the return value (exit [int](!$?)), since by convention a numeric exit status 0 indicates success, whereas numeric non-zero exit codes are used for signaling error states.

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