powershell script stops if program fails (like bash `set -o errexit`)

Question

Is there an elegant Powershell script setting that would exit the running Powershell script (or shell instance) if a program fails?

I'm imagining something like Bash feature set -o errexit (or set -e) but for Powershell. In that feature, if a program in the bash script fails (process return code was not 0) then the bash shell instance immediately exits.

In powershell, the script could expliclty check $LastExitCode or $? (if($?){exit}). However, that becomes cumbersome to do for every program call. Maybe powershell has a feature to automatically check and react to program return codes?

To explain in a script

Using made-up idiom Set-Powershell-Auto-Exit

Set-Powershell-Auto-Exit "ProgramReturnCode"  # what should this be?
& "program.exe" --fail  # this program fails with an error code
& "foo.exe"             # this never runs because script has exited

Can't you place the code in a Try Catch block and then simply exit? — Mark Kram
– Mark Kram, Commented Sep 16, 2019 at 0:31
@MarkKram a try ... catch would require many lines of code. I was looking for a one-line statement that would set the powershell script mode, similar to bash set -e. — JamesThomasMoon
– JamesThomasMoon, Commented Sep 16, 2019 at 1:11

mklement0 · Accepted Answer · 2023-08-02 20:33:09Z

10

Unfortunately, as of PowerShell (Core) 7.3.x, PowerShell offers no way to automatically exit a script when an external program reports a nonzero exit code.

However, as first noted in Daniel T's answer, an experimental feature, PSNativeCommandErrorActionPreference is available in v7.3 and preview versions of v7.4, which, if the $PSNativeCommandArgumentPassing preference variable is set to $true, emits a PowerShell error in response to an external program's nonzero exit code, which is therefore subject to the value of the $ErrorActionPreference preference variable; caveat:
- Experimental features may or may not become stable features.
- This GitHub query shows a current list of unresolved issues relating to the experimental feature.

For PowerShell-native commands only (cmdlets, scripts, functions), $ErrorActionPreference = 'Stop' can be used, which results in exit code 1.

If you need more control over what exit code is reported, see this answer.
For an overview of how PowerShell reports exit codes to the outside world, see this answer.

For external programs, you must test for $LASTEXITCODE -eq 0 explicitly and take action based on that, but as a workaround you can use a helper function for all external-program invocations, as shown in this answer.

edited Aug 2, 2023 at 20:33

answered Sep 16, 2019 at 1:36

mklement0

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1 Comment

Joe Skeen May 18 at 2:03

This seems to be in the latest PowerShell without any flags: github.com/PowerShell/PowerShell-RFC/pull/…

Daniel T · Accepted Answer · 2025-05-18 02:21:56Z

3

As of PowerShell 7.3.0 preview, there is an experimental implementation for exiting scripts when external programs fail. The new RFC PR has moved to another link. As of PowerShell 7.4, the feature is no longer experimental.

# Global config setup for before 7.4.0
Enable-ExperimentalFeature PSNativeCommandErrorActionPreference
exit

Then this can be used in each script:

# Per-script setup
$ErrorActionPreference = 'Stop'
$PSNativeCommandUseErrorActionPreference = $true

# Code from original question
& {
    & program.exe --fail  # this program fails with an error code
    & foo.exe             # this never runs because script has exited
}

edited May 18 at 2:21

answered Jun 5, 2023 at 21:17

Daniel T

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1 Comment

Joe Skeen May 18 at 2:02

This seems to be in the latest PowerShell without any flags: github.com/PowerShell/PowerShell-RFC/pull/…

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