Relationship of WMIC to WBEM

WMI is the Microsoft implementation of Web-based Enterprise Management (WBEM), a set of systems management technologies for use in distributed systems.  It is based on common standards like the Common Information Model (CIM).

The WBEM initiative was started in 1996 by BMC Software, Cisco, Compaq, Intel and Microsoft.

The specification for the CIM is maintained by the DMTF (Distributed Management Task Force), an industry standards organization consisting of members and alliance partners collaborating on specifications. It also maintains a repository of its operating policies on issues including IP.

Use wmic to debug printer status in cmd.exe

WMIC is Windows Management Instrumentation Command Line.  It is a command-line interface to WMI.

To use it to debug printer status on Windows, try the following in cmd.exe.

wmic printer get name, status

If status is Error this needs investigation.

WMIC - The "Instrumentation" Command Line

Ever heard to WMIC ("Wemmick")?  It is a great tool that can be used at the command prompt.

To view all the logical drives on a Windows machine you can do:

>wmic
wmic:root\cli> logicaldisk
wmic:root\cli> get caption

Will print out the caption column of the logicaldisk output.