Let’s say you are migrating from another system and you need to create multiple site collection by PowerShell ?

This code covers :

1. How to connect to office 365 using credentials stored in a text file, so that you don’t have to re-authenticate each time you run it.
2. Iterate an array of sites URL to be created
3. Create team sites (template sts). The template id has been found with Get-SPOSite on an existing website. You can create a site manually and find its template this way

1. Connect to Office

This is the part that shall be done once per tenant, to save the account password as a text file.

[code language=”powershell”]
Read-Host -Prompt “” -AsSecureString | ConvertFrom-SecureString | Out-File “C:\DEV\tenantcred.txt”
[/code]
Once this done, call the helper with your tenant name (adminUPN), it will build the admin URL automatically (https://tenant-admin.sharepoint.com):

[code language=”powershell”]
ConnectToO365 $passwordCredAsText $adminUPN $orgName
[/code]

3. Create the site collections

To know which template you shall create, you could create one manually and get it using Get-SPOSite with the -detailed fl (full list parameter)

[code language=”powershell”]
#Get-SPOSite -Identity https://mytenant.sharepoint.com/sites/site1 -detailed |fl
[/code]
Then create your site collection :

[code language=”powershell”]
New-SPOSite -Url $url -Template “STS#0” -Owner “domain\\account1” -StorageQuota
“26214400”
[/code]

The full code (create this file as createSites.ps1)

[code language=”powershell”]
$orgName = “mytenant”
$adminUPN = “myaccount@tenant.com”

$passwordCredAsText = “C:\DEV\myCred.txt”
. ./ConnectToAdminO365Admin.ps1
ConnectToO365 $passwordCredAsText $adminUPN $orgName

#view a site information
#Get-SPOSite -Identity https://mytenant.sharepoint.com/sites/site1

#do not put a “/” at the end of the url
$arrayOfUrl = @(“http://mytenant.sharepoint.com/sites/site2”,
“https://mytenant.sharepoint.com/sites/site3”, “https://mytenant.sharepoint.com/sites/site4”)

foreach ($url in $arrayOfUrl) {
Write-Host “Creating $url”
New-SPOSite -Url $url -Template “STS#0” -Owner “domain\\account1” -StorageQuota “26214400”
#”https://$orgName.sharepoint.com/sites/$siteUrl”
}

#show site information such as site template : STS#0
#Get-SPOSite -Identity https://mytenant.sharepoint.com/sites/qed -detailed |fl
[/code]

The helper (create this as a second file)

Create a file named :

ConnectToAdminO365Admin.ps1

[code language=”powershell”]
###############################
#.SYNOPSIS
###############################
# By JEFF ANGAMA 19 02 2018 – https://twitter.com/jeffangama
# This code shall be tested before ran onto production
#.DESCRIPTION
#Long description
# Before connecting to O365, this function allow you to save your password securely so that you dont have to retype it in future.
# Use the command below, rename the text file to suit your tenant
# Then run this function, see the example section for example
# COMMAND to store your credentials
# dev
#.PARAMETER sInputFile
#Parameter description
#
#.PARAMETER adminEmail
#Parameter description
#
#.PARAMETER orgName
#Parameter description
# What is the o365 org name ? its the tenant name, to build the admin url https://$orgName-admin.sharepoint.com
#.EXAMPLE
#An example
#
#$orgName = “mytenant”
#$adminUPN = “account@domain.com”
#$passwordCredAsText = “C:\DEVMIS\myTenantCred.txt”
#. ./../Common/PS/O365/ConnectToAdminO365Admin.ps1
#ConnectToO365 $passwordCredAsText $adminUPN $orgName
#.NOTES
#General notes
##############################
function ConnectToO365 {
param ($sInputFile, $adminEmail, $orgName)
Write-Host -ForeGroundColor Green “Ensure you have stored your password in text file, refer to the help in this function”

#run this command once
#Read-Host -Prompt “” -AsSecureString | ConvertFrom-SecureString | Out-File “C:\DEV\tenantcred.txt”
$orgName = $orgName
$tenantAdminURL = “https://$orgName-admin.sharepoint.com”
$Pass = Get-Content $sInputFile | ConvertTo-SecureString
$userCredential = new-object -typename System.Management.Automation.PSCredential($adminEmail, $Pass)
Write-Host “Connecting Connect-SPOService -Url $tenantAdminURL -Credential $userCredential”

Connect-SPOService -Url $tenantAdminURL -Credential $userCredential

Write-Host “Connected to $tenantAdminURL with $adminEmail”
}
[/code]

What we’ve seen

We have seen how to create a script that creates multiple site collections and how to connect to office 365 quickly without retyping credentials

References

• List of Commands
• Installation and getting started with SharePoint Online Management Shell by Nicolas Bouchard
• Other commands listed here by Aptillon