Determine installed PowerShell version

Question

How can I determine what version of PowerShell is installed on a computer, and indeed if it is installed at all?

Answer 1

I needed to check the version of PowerShell and then run the appropriate code. Some of our servers run v5, and others v4. This means that some functions, like compress, may or may not be available.

This is my solution:

if ($PSVersionTable.PSVersion.Major -eq 5) {
    #Execute code available in PowerShell 5, like Compress
    Write-Host "You are running PowerShell version 5"
}
else {
    #Use a different process
    Write-Host "This is version $PSVersionTable.PSVersion.Major"
}