Powershell script to retrieve a deployed wsp from configuration database : SharePoint 2010

Many a times, we find ourselves in a situation wherein we want to find out what are the contents of a deployed wsp so as to debug issues, compare releases etc.

This is not such a trivial task as the sharepoint central administration pages do not provide us with any option to retrieve a deployed wsp from the sharepoint configuration database.

This task can be done through a powershell script. The powershell script given below takes 2 parameters:

- The display name of the solution to retrieve (.wsp file)
- A path on the local machine where the retrieved wsp will be saved.

If no name of the solution is given , it displays the list of deployed solutions to the user and lets the user choose the solution to retrieve. Many more such scripts can be seen at the source project for this script available at http://sharepointpsscripts.codeplex.com/


param ([string] $name, [string] $localpath)
#Load the required SharePoint assemblies containing the classes used in the script
#The Out-Null cmdlet instructs the interpreter to not output anything to the interactive shell
#Otherwise information about each assembly being loaded would be displayed
[System.Reflection.Assembly]::Load("Microsoft.SharePoint, Version=12.0.0.0 , Culture=Neutral, PublicKeyToken=71e9bce111e9429c") | Out-Null

function Get-SolutionName()
{
    # Initialize an empty hashtable to store solution names and indexes
    $solHash = @{};
   
    # Bind to the collections of all solutions in the local farm and process them one by one, storing names in a hashtable
    # under automatically incremented indexes
    # The Foreach-Object cmdlet uses the begin/process/end structure to initialize the $i index counter
    ([Microsoft.SharePoint.Administration.SPFarm]::Local).Solutions |
        Foreach-Object {$i=1;} {$solHash.$i = $_.displayname; $i++} { }
   
    Write-Host;
   
    # If solutions were found, present the user with selection
    if ($solHash.Count -gt 0)
    {
        Write-Host -Object "The following solutions were found in the farm:" -ForegroundColor Green -BackgroundColor DarkMagenta;
        Write-Host;
       
        # Hashtables are not sortable, so in order to sort solutions by index keys have to be sorted separately first
        $solHash.Keys | Sort-Object | Foreach-Object {Write-Host -Object $("`t[{0}] {1}" -f $_, $solHash[$_]) -ForegroundColor Yellow -BackgroundColor DarkMagenta;}
        Write-Host;
        Write-Host -Object "Enter the index number of the solution you wish to retrieve, or 0 (zero) to exit: " -NoNewLine -ForegroundColor Green -BackgroundColor DarkMagenta;
       
        # Obtain input from user and return the matching value from the hashtable
        return $solHash[[int](Read-Host)];
    }
   
    # No solutions found in the configuration database
    else
    {
        Write-Host -Object "The local farm's solution store contains no solutions." -ForegroundColor Green -BackgroundColor DarkMagenta;
        Write-Host;
    }
}
# Check if name of target solution was specified as a parameter
if (-not $name)
{
    # Name of solution was not specifed, so call the Get-SolutionName function to obtain the name
    $name = Get-SolutionName;
   
    # If after calling the function the name is still unknown, stop execution
    if (-not $name)
    { break; }
}
# Check if local path to save the file to was specified as a parameter
if (-not $localpath)
{
    Write-Host;
    # Prompt and obtain local path value from user
    Write-Host -Object "Enter the local path to the folder you want the solution file to be saved to: " -ForegroundColor Green -BackgroundColor DarkMagenta;
    $localpath = Read-Host;
}
# Check if the path specified is valid and throw an exception if it's not
if (-not $(Test-Path -Path $localpath -PathType Container))
{
    throw "`"$localpath`" is not a valid path! If the path contains spaces, it must be enclosed in SINGLE quotes."
}
# Try to bind to the target solution
$solution = ([Microsoft.SharePoint.Administration.SPFarm]::Local).Solutions | Where-Object {$_.Name -eq $name}
Write-Host;
# Check if solution was found
if ($solution -ne $null)
{
    # Constitute the full local path (including file name)
    $solPath = Join-Path -Path $localpath -ChildPath $solution.SolutionFile.Name;
   
    # Try and save solution file locally
 $solution.SolutionFile.SaveAs($solPath);
   
    # If no errors occurred, display a success message
    if ($?)
    {
    Write-Host "Solution file saved successfully to $solPath" -ForegroundColor Green -BackgroundColor DarkMagenta;
       Write-Host;
    }
}
# Solution not found in the store; display a warning message
else
{
 Write-Host -Object "Solution `"$name`" could not be found!" -ForegroundColor Red -BackgroundColor DarkMagenta;
    Write-Host;
}