PowerShell commands no longer recognized

Question

I installed a package on my Win7 x64 computer using Chocolately. As part of the installation, it wanted to upgrade PowerShell to 5.0. Since this happened basic PowerShell commands no longer work. I've searched around on the web and haven't really found anything useful. I'm really stumped on what to do.

Here's an example:

PS>Get-Location
Get-Location : The term 'Get-Location' is not recognized as the name of a cmdlet, function, script file, or operable
program. Check the spelling of the name, or if a path was included, verify that the path is correct and try again.
At line:1 char:1
+ Get-Location
+ ~~~~~~~~~~~~
    + CategoryInfo          : ObjectNotFound: (Get-Location:String) [], CommandNotFoundException
    + FullyQualifiedErrorId : CommandNotFoundException

PS>

I can see that it's resolving aliases for my commands, for instance:

PS>dir
dir : The term 'Get-ChildItem' is not recognized as the name of a cmdlet, function, script file, or operable program.
Check the spelling of the name, or if a path was included, verify that the path is correct and try again.
At line:1 char:1
+ dir
+ ~~~
    + CategoryInfo          : ObjectNotFound: (Get-ChildItem:String) [], CommandNotFoundException
    + FullyQualifiedErrorId : CommandNotFoundException

PS>

I have another alias set in my $profile and I can see that it is getting recognized. If I type xx my PowerShell instance will close:

function global:xx
{   
    exit
}

The $env:psmodulepath seems to be correct:

PS>$env:psmodulepath
C:\Users\myuserid\Documents\WindowsPowerShell\Modules;C:\Program Files (x86)\PowerShell Community Extensions\Pscx3\;C:\w
indows\system32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\Modules";C:\Program Files\WindowsPowerShell\Modules
PS>cmd
Microsoft Windows [Version 6.1.7601]
Copyright (c) 2009 Microsoft Corporation.  All rights reserved.

C:\windows\system32>dir c:\windows\system32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\Modules
 Volume in drive C is OS
 Volume Serial Number is 605E-A0FF

 Directory of c:\windows\system32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\Modules

06/22/2016  11:41 PM    <DIR>          .
06/22/2016  11:41 PM    <DIR>          ..
05/20/2016  02:24 PM    <DIR>          ApplicationServer
06/22/2016  11:41 PM    <DIR>          CimCmdlets
06/22/2016  11:41 PM    <DIR>          ISE
06/22/2016  11:41 PM    <DIR>          Microsoft.PowerShell.Archive
06/22/2016  11:41 PM    <DIR>          Microsoft.PowerShell.Diagnostics
06/22/2016  11:41 PM    <DIR>          Microsoft.PowerShell.Host
06/22/2016  11:41 PM    <DIR>          Microsoft.PowerShell.Management
06/22/2016  11:41 PM    <DIR>          Microsoft.PowerShell.ODataUtils
06/22/2016  11:41 PM    <DIR>          Microsoft.PowerShell.Security
06/22/2016  11:41 PM    <DIR>          Microsoft.PowerShell.Utility
06/22/2016  11:41 PM    <DIR>          Microsoft.WSMan.Management
06/22/2016  11:41 PM    <DIR>          NetworkSwitchManager
06/22/2016  11:41 PM    <DIR>          PSDesiredStateConfiguration
06/22/2016  11:41 PM    <DIR>          PSDiagnostics
06/22/2016  11:41 PM    <DIR>          PSScheduledJob
06/22/2016  11:41 PM    <DIR>          PSWorkflow
06/22/2016  11:41 PM    <DIR>          PSWorkflowUtility
11/21/2010  02:24 AM    <DIR>          TroubleshootingPack
10/31/2014  04:26 PM    <DIR>          WebAdministration
               0 File(s)              0 bytes
              21 Dir(s)   2,301,882,368 bytes free

C:\windows\system32>

Solution

PowerShell commands no longer work

The $env:psmodulepath seems to be correct:

$env:psmodulepath
C:\Users\myuserid\Documents\WindowsPowerShell\Modules;C:\Program Files (x86)\PowerShell Community Extensions\Pscx3\;C:\windows\system32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\Modules";C:\Program Files\WindowsPowerShell\Modules

You have a " (double quote) in the middle of your $env:psmodulepath which isn't there on my installation:

PS F:\test> $env:psmodulepath
C:\Users\DavidPostill\Documents\WindowsPowerShell\Modules;C:\Program Files\WindowsPowerShell\Modules;C:\Windows\system32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\Modules

You can remove the double quote by setting $env:psmodulepath explicitly yourself.

Comments

[Ƭᴇcʜιᴇ007]

To avoid us suggesting things you already tried, please edit your question and include what it is you've tried already.

[Peter Hahndorf]

Do you have C:\WINDOWS\system32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\Modules in $env:psmodulepath? Seems to me the installation killed your PsModulePath environment variable

[Eric]

Yes, I see the following PS>$env:psmodulepath C:\Users\myuserid\Documents\WindowsPowerShell\Modules;C:\Pro‌​gram Files (x86)\PowerShell Community Extensions\Pscx3\;C:\w indows\system32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\Modules";C:\Program Files\WindowsPowerShell\Modules PS>

[DavidPostill]

You have a " (double quote) in the middle of your $env:psmodulepath which isn't there on my installation (C:\Users\DavidPostill\Documents\WindowsPowerShell\Modules;C‌​:\Program Files\WindowsPowerShell\Modules;C:\Windows\system32\WindowsP‌​owerShell\v1.0\Modul‌​es. I bet that is the cause of your problem.

[Eric]

I think that may be the problem. I've found msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd878326(v=vs.85).aspx but there seems to be a typo in it. The command to create a permanent and temporary change to the $env:psmodulepath is the same on that page.

[Eric]

DavidPostill, I did a $env:PSModulePath="C:\Users\myuserid\Documents\WindowsPowerS‌​hell\Modules;C:\Prog‌​ram Files (x86)\PowerShell Community Extensions\Pscx3\;C:\windows\system32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0‌​\Modules;C:\Program Files\WindowsPowerShell\Modules" and it fixed the problem. You should rephrase your comment as an answer to the question.

[ferventcoder]

Did the PowerShell upgrade complete successfully? I'd like to see what the logs state here. Something weird is definitely going on. Can you provide the log files for where PowerShell 5 upgrade was attempted?

[ferventcoder]

I wonder if there is a bug with the PowerShell package or with Chocolatey. Not ruling out either right now.

[DavidPostill]

@eric Answer added. Please remember the @ next time - I only noticed by accident that you had addressed a comment to me ;)

[DavidPostill]

@Eric Where is the typo in the MS link? (it's not obvious)

[Eric]

The commands for To add a temporary value that is available only for the current session, run the following command at the command line and To add a persistent value that is available whenever a session is opened, add the following command to a Windows PowerShell profile: are identical. The comments at the bottom of the article mention it.

[DavidPostill]

@Eric Ah. OK. Neither of those are the cause of the extra double quote though.

[ferventcoder]

I'm most curious what caused the double quote in the first place.

[DavidPostill]

@ferventcoder My Powershell upgraded to 5 successfully (with no double quote). That was a direct install though, I don't use Chocolatey

[ferventcoder]

I would have expected that to work properly. I'm trying to determine if it is a bug in Chocolatey or the PowerShell package.

[Eric]

I think the chocolatey package that I installed that upgraded Powershell was the ChocolateyGUI: chocolatey.org/packages/ChocolateyGUI I also installed html-tidy, but I don't think that was the culprit chocolatey.org/packages/html-tidy