Working Around PowerShell's Set-alias
PowerShell’s set-alias command is very limited by its apparent inability to easily accept parameters for commands that are being aliased. Those of us who are used to Linux shells where aliases such as alias ls="ls -lh" are commonplace have to wrap our heads around the fact that the ideal use case for set-alias is a only a simple one to one mapping like set-alias sql invoke-sqlcmd.
Fortunately, there’s a simple workaround:
function vehicles { invoke-sqlcmd "select * from agencyvehicle" }
Use a function instead! The syntax is concise and doesn’t come with any harmful side effects.
Edit (2010/12/02) – more logical to use a function rather than an alias to a function (duh!).