Clear notifications

[Paige__Tanner]

Hello!

Is it possible to clear the current Windows notifications from PowerShell?

By notifications I mean the ones shown by the bell in the rightmost point of the taskbar. I don't want to avoid receiving notifications, but just to clear the ones that are present in this moment.

I am using Windows 11 and PowerShell 7.4.

The only solution I found is this one, but if I try

[Windows.UI.Notifications.ToastNotificationManager, Windows.UI.Notifications, ContentType = WindowsRuntime] | Out-Null

 I got an error:

InvalidOperation: Unable to find type [Windows.UI.Notifications.ToastNotificationManager, Windows.UI.Notifications, ContentType = WindowsRuntime].

both from a user shell and from an Administrator shell.

[#2]

@Paige__Tanner I tested this, and that works:

# get the list of all registry keys
$notifications = Get-ChildItem HKCU:\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Notifications\Settings | Select-Object Name

# iterate through the keys, extract the name that will be used in the clear function, and clear the notifications
for ($index = 0; $index -lt $notifications.Count; $index++) {
    $name = $notifications[$index]
    $split = $name -split "\\"
    $last = $split[$split.Count - 1]
    $last = $last.Substring(0, $last.Length - 1)
    ([Windows.UI.Notifications.ToastNotificationManager]::History).clear($last)
}

(Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/PowerShell/comments/qzxh5n/how_to_programmatically_clear_win10_notification...)

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[#3]

@Harm_Veenstra Thanks for having tried. This doesn't work for me. Running the same script, I get many errors equal to this one:

InvalidOperation: C:\test_script.ps1:10
Line |
  10 |      ([Windows.UI.Notifications.ToastNotificationManager]::History).cl …
     |       ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
     | Unable to find type [Windows.UI.Notifications.ToastNotificationManager].

which are probably related to the error mentioned in my first post. I wonder why my system does not have [Windows.UI.Notifications.ToastNotificationManager].

[#4]

I'm also running Windows 11 and PowerShell 7.4 and I ran the script there without issues... But I tried it again now, and I have the same error as you. It does work in PowerShell v5, however... Confused :)

[#5]

Seems to be something with the built-in WinRT support that has been removed in PS7?

[#6]

@Harm_Veenstra

It could be something similar, yes. Some missing module or framework? But what exactly?

I can only add that I tried your script also on Windows PowerShell 5.1 and in my case it gives error as well:

Unable to find type [Windows.UI.Notifications.ToastNotificationManager].
At C:\test_script.ps1:10 char:6
+     ([Windows.UI.Notifications.ToastNotificationManager]::History).cl ...
+      ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
    + CategoryInfo          : InvalidOperation: (Windows.UI.Noti...ficationManager:TypeName) [], RuntimeException
    + FullyQualifiedErrorId : TypeNotFound

[#7]

Do you have the Microsoft Windows Desktop Runtime installed?

[#8]

I didn't. Now I just installed it and the script works with Windows PowerShell 5.1, but not in PowerShell 7.4. It's better than before, but there is still something missing.

[#9 · Accepted solution]

Yes, because the RunTime isn't included in PowerShell 7.4. I'm afraid we can't fix that since the support for WinRT has been removed after just a few versions of PowerShell 7.

[#10]

Ok! At least, it works on Windows PowerShell 5.1.
Thanks for all your suggestions and your help.