German Umlauts in Powershell called by vbs

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i do have a ps1 file, which create a Link

create-link.ps1

$path = $env:HOMESHARE + "\My Projects\"
If(!(test-path $path))
{
    New-Item -ItemType Directory -Force -Path $path
}

$WshShell = New-Object -comObject WScript.Shell
$Shortcut = $WshShell.CreateShortcut($env:HOMESHARE + "\My Projects\" + "linkname.lnk")
$Shortcut.TargetPath = "\\path\for\link"
$Shortcut.Description = "äöüß"
$Shortcut.IconLocation = $env:SYSTEMROOT + "\\system32\\shell32.dll,3"
$Shortcut.Save()

I also do have a vbs file which calls the ps1

create-link.vbs

command = "powershell.exe Get-Content ""C:\path\to\file\create-link.ps1"" | PowerShell.exe -noprofile"
set shell = CreateObject("WScript.Shell")
shell.Run command,0

Both files are saved with utf-8 encoding.

This construction was necessary, because the ps1 needed to run completly headless without any noticable things for the user. Calling a ps1 through a vbs solved this problem, if there is a better way i would be happy if you let me know.

If i am calling the powershell script directly or with "powershell.exe Get-Content ""C:\path\to\file\create-link.ps1"" | PowerShell.exe -noprofile" (by using cmd) everything works fine. However, if i call the vbs to do the work it works in general, but the german umlauts from 'Description' are just questions marks, so somehow the encoding got scrambled. Is there any way to fix this?

character-encoding vbscript powershell shell windows
1 Answers

tl;dr:

  • Save your *.ps1 file as UTF-8 with BOM.

  • Simplify your command by using the PowerShell CLI's -File parameter:

command = "powershell.exe -NoProfile -File ""C:\path\to\file\create-link.ps1"""

See also: GitHub issue #3028, which requests the ability to launch PowerShell itself completely hidden - obviating the need for an aux. VBScript script - which a future version may support (but it won't be back-ported to Windows PowerShell).

If you're using Windows PowerShell (versions up to v5.1), you must save your *.ps1 files as UTF-8 with a BOM in order for them to be interpreted correctly with respect to characters outside the ASCII (7-bit) range, such as äöüß.
This is no longer necessary in PowerShell [Core] v6+, which consistently defaults to UTF-8, but if your scripts need to run in both editions, you should always use UTF-8 with BOM.

If a given *.ps1 doesn't have a BOM, Windows PowerShell interprets each byte that is part of an UTF-8 encoding sequence (all non-ASCII characters are encoded as 2-4 bytes) individually as a character, based on the system's active ANSI code page (a single-byte encoding such as Windows-1252).

On a US-English system, where the active ANSI code page is Windows-1252, the above sample string therefore surfaces as garbage string äöüß

Note that question marks, or, more accurately, instances of � (REPLACEMENT CHARACTER, U+FFFD), would only surface in the reverse scenario: when ANSI-encoded text is misinterpreted as UTF-8.

As an aside, re your approach of providing the source code to the PowerShell CLI via the pipeline (stdin):

Since your script apparently runs hidden, it won't make a difference in your case, but note that this technique exhibits pseudo-interactive mode and also doesn't support passing arguments to the script being provided via stdin - see GitHub issue #3223

user_453750
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