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Add a timestamp to transcript #24135
Description
Summary of the new feature / enhancement
As a user, I want to have the ability to enable timestamps with Start-Transcript command,
so that when the transcript is saved it automatically prefixes the output with the date.
There would be a question whether the timestamp should default to current time on the machine, or to UTC.
Proposed technical implementation details (optional)
Start-Transcript ./log.txt -IncludeTimeStamp
Write-Host "This is a test"
Stop-Transcript
gc log.txt
2024-08-23:11:04 This is a test
Activity
iRon7 commentedon Aug 11, 2024
Related:
#17588Add callback feature to Start-Transcript.SteveL-MSFT commentedon Aug 12, 2024
@thekamilpro just to be clear, you want a timestamp for each line of output?
kamilprocyszyn commentedon Aug 13, 2024
Steve Lee (@SteveL-MSFT) yes - expanded example below.
kilasuit commentedon Aug 21, 2024
A few thoughts - as this is something that I know lots would like to see Transcription be more flexible
This is already sorta available when using the
-IncludeInvocationHeaderparameter - albeit not in that simple or friendly an output and far too much info for this simple a need.There is a sample output with the full invocation header in the PowerShell loves the blue team blog post
We could address this ask with update the output from the
UseMinimalHeaderparameter so that it outputs an inline header with timestamp however this would break any current ingestion mechanisms, so I think we shouldn't do thisHowever if we added just this ask
Otherwise & what I think makes more sense & be additive and less of an upset would be adding a
-InvocationDetailsparameter that allows controlling the display of each commands InvocationTime, how we format it, what the duration was & what the completion time was` (exposing some of the info from Get-History)Doing all of this would have perf impact though
Example with InvocationTimeStamp & completion time with inline/wrapped options (I prefer inline with InvocationTime only btw)
additional longer term thoughts
OR perhaps a longer term thought (but is lots more work)Provide a way for the logging format to be fully customisable from what we already use within the
-IncludeInvocationHeaderand provide a-UseCustomHeaderswitch parameter, along with-CustomHeaderDefinitionwhich takes everything thatIncludeInvocationHeaderprovides today, whilst surfacing any additional per line properties that we may define as being of useThis could be then used to capture a slightly reduced set of entries in a transcription file, but also enables a custom parser of each transcription entry for orgs to use downstream
It could also enable the scenario for each line in a transcription or the full transcription file to be run through
Protect-CMSMessageor other similar methods inc PGP so can potentially negate some of the worries behind exposing secrets and follows on from the point made from the Security WG back in 2022.Details
SydneyhSmith commentedon Sep 9, 2024
This is something we could consider if we make improvements to transcription logging
jwyker commentedon Feb 26, 2025
Any update on this? Would be a great improvement to transcript logging.
iSazonov commentedon Feb 27, 2025
Justin Wyker (@jwyker) As far as I understand, the working group does not have a clear approval, but this can be added as an experimental feature so that we can evaluate this change based on feedback.
lvde0 commentedon May 14, 2025
Yes, this definitely seems like a useful feature. Especially for monitoring scripts running in headless environments.
soroshsabz commentedon Oct 7, 2026
Add -IncludeTimeStamp parameter to Start-Transcript