Istar Pack

A single-file PowerShell script that turns a fresh Windows machine into a fully loaded terminal workstation in one run. It installs the Scoop package manager, Oh My Posh, Zoxide, FZF, 7-Zip, a Nerd Font, the recommended PowerShell modules, and writes a hardened profile tuned for both Windows PowerShell 5.1 and PowerShell 7+. It also ships a curated catalog of six Oh My Posh themes, with the signature one being Garden's Dream (minimalist green).

The script is interactive: launch it, pick a theme, press Enter, and walk away. No manual JSON editing, no copy-pasting profile snippets, no chasing down which module goes where. It auto-detects your PowerShell edition and adapts the profile it writes accordingly.

Why Istar Pack

Most PowerShell setup guides are scattered across five blog posts, three GitHub gists, and a stale Reddit thread. You end up cobbling together a profile from copy-pasted fragments, half of which are deprecated, and the other half assume you are running PS 7 when you are actually on PS 5.1. Istar Pack replaces that entire workflow with a single .ps1 file that you run once.

The script is opinionated. It picks tools that are well-maintained, free, and work on both PowerShell editions. It writes a profile that fixes long-standing annoyances (the UpArrow / ListView conflict, the missing 7z dependency in extract(), the deprecated acrylicOpacity, the wrong PS version requirement). And it gives you six themes to choose from, so your terminal does not have to look like everyone else's.

If you have ever spent an afternoon getting Oh My Posh to render correctly, this script is for you.

Features

One-shot install. Scoop, Oh My Posh, Zoxide, FZF, 7-Zip, a Nerd Font, and the recommended PowerShell modules, all in one run.
Cross-edition support. Auto-detects PowerShell 5.1 vs 7+ and emits the correct profile for each. PS 7 gets HistoryAndPlugin prediction and the native `e escape; PS 5.1 gets History prediction and [char]27.
Six built-in themes. Garden's Dream, Midnight Cyber, Sakura Bloom, Solar Flare, Mono Slate, Dracula Reborn. Each is a self-contained Oh My Posh v2 JSON definition.
Theme-aware TUI. The whole Istar Pack interface (banner, menu, progress bar, box titles) recolors to match the currently selected theme. Pick a theme and the setup tool itself changes color.
Smooth arrow-key navigation. The menu uses differential redraw: only the two changed rows are repainted on each key press, not the entire screen. No flicker, no lag.
Auto-growing console. On launch, Istar Pack tries to grow the console window to 50 rows (capped at your physical screen height) so the tall screens (Verification, Theme Catalog, About) fit without being cut off. If the window cannot grow, a tall scrollback buffer is left in place so you can still scroll to see everything.
Backup before overwrite. Your existing profile is copied to $HOME\.istar-pack\backups\ with a timestamp before it is replaced.
JSON settings persistence. Your theme choice, toggles, and last install timestamp are saved to $HOME\.istar-pack\settings.json and restored on next launch.
Silent mode. Run with -Silent for non-interactive installs (useful for box-setup scripts, Ansible, or DSC).
UTF-8 with BOM. The .ps1 file is saved as UTF-8 with BOM so that Windows PowerShell 5.1 parses the box-drawing characters correctly. Without BOM, PS 5.1 falls back to ANSI and the TUI breaks.

Requirements

Operating System: Windows 10 or Windows 11. The script relies on Scoop, which is Windows-only.
PowerShell: 5.1 or later. Both Windows PowerShell 5.1 and PowerShell 7+ are supported. The script auto-detects the edition and adapts.
Execution Policy: Must allow local script execution. Run Set-ExecutionPolicy -ExecutionPolicy RemoteSigned -Scope CurrentUser in an elevated prompt if you have never done so.
Internet access: Required for the first run (Scoop bootstrap, module downloads, font download). Subsequent runs are mostly offline.
No administrator privileges required. Scoop installs into your user profile, so Istar Pack works without elevation. If you happen to be running as Administrator, the script will note it but will not change behavior.

Quick Start

Download Istar-Pack.ps1 from this repository.
Open PowerShell (5.1 or 7+).

If you have never run a local script before, allow local scripts:

Set-ExecutionPolicy -ExecutionPolicy RemoteSigned -Scope CurrentUser

Navigate to the download folder and launch the script:
```
.\Istar-Pack.ps1
```
Use the arrow keys to pick Full install (recommended) and press Enter. Wait for the install to finish.
Close and reopen your terminal. You should see the new prompt with your selected theme.

For a non-interactive install with the default theme:

.\Istar-Pack.ps1 -Silent

To skip loading or saving settings (truly ephemeral run):

.\Istar-Pack.ps1 -NoPersist

How It Works

Istar Pack is a single self-contained .ps1 file. When you launch it, the following happens in order:

Bootstrap. UTF-8 encoding is forced on the console layer. The PowerShell version is detected. The console window is grown to 50 rows if possible.
Settings load. If $HOME\.istar-pack\settings.json exists, your previous theme choice and toggles are loaded.
Main menu. An interactive TUI renders the Istar Pack banner, a status bar (progress toggle, debug toggle, runtime version, active theme), and a list of menu options. Use arrow keys to navigate, Enter to select, Esc to cancel.
Full install flow. When you select Full install, the script runs seven steps in sequence:
- Install Scoop if missing.
- Install CLI tools (oh-my-posh, zoxide, fzf, 7zip, git) via Scoop.
- Install PowerShell modules (Terminal-Icons, PSReadLine, PSFzf, and CompletionPredictor on PS 7+).
- Install a Nerd Font (Cascadia Code) if not already present.
- Back up your existing profile to $HOME\.istar-pack\backups\.
- Write the selected theme's JSON to your PowerShell directory.
- Write the new profile, with theme path, zoxide init, PSReadLine config, and safe module imports.
Verification. The Verification screen runs sanity checks on every tool, module, and path, and shows you a green / red status table.
Settings save. Your theme choice and last-install timestamp are persisted to settings.json.

You can re-run the script any time. It will detect what is already installed and skip the work, which makes it safe to use as a "repair" tool when something has gone wrong with your terminal.

Themes

Istar Pack ships six themes. Each theme is a complete Oh My Posh v2 JSON definition embedded directly in the script; no theme files are downloaded from the internet.

Key	Name	Description
GardensDream	Garden's Dream	Minimalist green. User + path + git. The signature look.
MidnightCyber	Midnight Cyber	Dark blue with neon cyan accents. Cyberpunk vibe, single block.
SakuraBloom	Sakura Bloom	Pink / magenta pastel. Soft and warm, ideal for daytime coding.
SolarFlare	Solar Flare	Orange-red gradient on dark background. Bold and energetic.
MonoSlate	Mono Slate	Pure grayscale, no colors. Maximum focus, zero distraction.
DraculaReborn	Dracula Reborn	Classic Dracula palette (purple / pink / cyan), single-line.

To preview all themes without committing to one, choose Browse theme catalog from the main menu. To switch themes after install, choose Select theme; the script writes the new theme JSON and rewrites your profile to point at it.

When you select a theme, the Istar Pack TUI itself recolors to match. The banner ASCII art, the progress bar, and the box accent colors all follow the active theme. This makes it easier to preview how the theme will feel before you commit.

Configuration

Istar Pack stores its configuration in your user home directory so that settings survive even if you move or re-download the script.

File Locations

Path	Purpose
`$HOME\.istar-pack\settings.json`	Theme choice, toggles, last-install timestamp.
`$HOME\.istar-pack\backups\`	Timestamped copies of your previous PowerShell profile.
`$HOME\Documents\PowerShell\`	PS 7 profile directory.
`$HOME\Documents\WindowsPowerShell\`	PS 5.1 profile directory.
`<profile dir>\<ThemeKey>.omp.json`	The Oh My Posh theme JSON for the selected theme.
`<profile dir>\Microsoft.PowerShell_profile.ps1`	Your rewritten PowerShell profile.

Settings Options

You can edit settings.json directly, or use the Open settings menu item inside Istar Pack. The available options are:

ShowProgress (true / false) - Show or hide the progress bar during installs.
DebugMode (true / false) - Print extra log lines for troubleshooting.
SelectedTheme (string) - One of the theme keys from the table above.
InstallModules (true / false) - Whether the Full install flow should install PowerShell modules.
InstallScoop (true / false) - Whether the Full install flow should install Scoop and CLI tools.
InstallFont (true / false) - Whether the Full install flow should install a Nerd Font.
LastFullInstall (timestamp) - When the Full install last completed successfully. Informational only.

Command-Line Switches

Switch	Effect
`-Silent`	Run the full install non-interactively with the saved theme.
`-NoPersist`	Do not load or save `settings.json` for this run.
`-ShowProgress 0	1`
`-EnableDebug 0	1`

What Gets Installed

Istar Pack installs the following tools via Scoop (which is itself installed if missing):

git - Version control. Required by Scoop for bucket operations and generally useful to have on PATH.
oh-my-posh - Prompt renderer. The whole point.
zoxide - Smarter cd replacement. Type z <part-of-path> to jump to a frequently visited directory.
fzf - Fuzzy finder. Wired into PSReadLine for Ctrl+t file search and Ctrl+r history search.
7zip - Archive tool. Used by the extract function in the profile to handle .7z, .zip, .tar.gz, and similar formats.

The following PowerShell modules are installed from the PowerShell Gallery:

Terminal-Icons - Adds file-type icons to Get-ChildItem output in modern terminals (Windows Terminal, WezTerm, iTerm2).
PSReadLine (latest) - Provides syntax highlighting, multi-line editing, and predictive IntelliSense. On PS 7, the CompletionPredictor plugin is also installed for ListView-style predictions.
PSFzf - PowerShell wrapper around fzf. Replaces the default Ctrl+t and Ctrl+r handlers with fzf-powered fuzzy versions.

A Nerd Font (Cascadia Code) is installed so that the Oh My Posh powerline glyphs and Terminal-Icons file icons render correctly. The font is installed for the current user only, no elevation required.

What the Profile Fixes

The profile that Istar Pack writes addresses several long-standing issues found in typical PowerShell setup guides:

UpArrow / ListView conflict. PSReadLine's ListView prediction view binds UpArrow to navigate the prediction list, which conflicts with using UpArrow for history navigation. The profile binds Ctrl+UpArrow and Ctrl+DownArrow for prediction navigation instead, leaving UpArrow free for history.
Missing 7z dependency. Many profiles define an extract function that calls 7z without checking whether it is installed. The Istar Pack profile verifies 7z is on PATH before calling it, and falls back to Expand-Archive for plain .zip files.
False async claim. Some guides claim that oh-my-posh runs asynchronously with --shell mode. It does not, on Windows. The profile drops the flag and uses the synchronous initializer, which is more reliable.
Deprecated acrylicOpacity. Windows Terminal deprecated this field; the profile does not emit it.
Wrong PS version requirement. Some snippets require PS 7.1 minimum even though they only need 5.1 features. The profile correctly gates PS 7-only features behind an edition check.

Additional quality-of-life improvements in the profile:

MaximumHistoryCount raised to 4096.
HistoryNoDuplicates enabled.
HistorySearchCursorMovesToEnd enabled.
Tab completion shows all matches on first Tab.
Modules are loaded inside try/catch blocks so a missing module never breaks the prompt.
zoxide is initialized with --cmd cd so the standard cd command gets the zoxide boost.

Uninstall and Rollback

Istar Pack is designed to be reversible. To roll back to your previous setup:

Open $HOME\.istar-pack\backups\ in File Explorer.
Find the most recent profile_PS7_<timestamp>.ps1 or profile_PS5_<timestamp>.ps1 file.
Copy it to your profile path (see the Configuration section above) and rename it to Microsoft.PowerShell_profile.ps1.
Delete the <ThemeKey>.omp.json file from the same directory if you no longer want the theme JSON present.
Restart your terminal.

To fully uninstall the tools Istar Pack installed:

scoop uninstall oh-my-posh zoxide fzf 7zip git
scoop uninstall scoop
Uninstall-Module Terminal-Icons -Force
Uninstall-Module PSFzf -Force
Uninstall-Module PSReadLine -Force  # PS 7 only - do not run on PS 5.1
Remove-Item -Recurse -Force $HOME\.istar-pack

Note: the Nerd Font is installed via a user-level font registration. To remove it, open Settings > Personalization > Fonts and uninstall "Cascadia Code NF" manually.

Troubleshooting

The TUI looks broken (weird characters, misaligned boxes)

Your console is not using a font that supports Unicode box-drawing characters. Use Windows Terminal with Cascadia Code or any Nerd Font. After Istar Pack finishes its install, the font issue will be solved for future runs as well.

The banner is cut off at the bottom

Istar Pack tries to grow the console to 50 rows on launch. If your window manager refused to grow (some Windows Terminal configurations lock the window size), the script leaves a tall scrollback buffer in place. Use the scroll wheel (or Shift+PageUp) to scroll down and see the rest of the screen. You can also manually resize the window and re-run the script.

`Set-ExecutionPolicy` errors when launching

You need to allow local scripts. Run, in an elevated PowerShell prompt:

Set-ExecutionPolicy -ExecutionPolicy RemoteSigned -Scope CurrentUser

This allows locally-created scripts to run without a signature, while still requiring downloaded scripts to be signed. It is the standard recommendation for developer machines.

Oh My Posh shows "command not found" after install

The Scoop shim directory is not on your PATH for the current session. Close and reopen your terminal. If the issue persists, run scoop reset oh-my-posh and try again.

The script fails with an encoding error on PS 5.1

The .ps1 file must be saved as UTF-8 with BOM. If you re-saved it with a text editor that strips the BOM (some editors do this by default), PS 5.1 will mis-parse the box-drawing characters. Re-download the file from this repository.

`7z` is reported as missing even after install

Close and reopen your terminal so the PATH refresh takes effect. If still missing, run scoop install 7zip manually and verify with Get-Command 7z.

I want to reset everything to defaults

Delete $HOME\.istar-pack\settings.json and re-launch the script. It will start fresh with the Garden's Dream theme and all toggles at their defaults.

FAQ

Is Istar Pack safe to run on my work machine?

It installs only well-known, open-source tools (Scoop, Oh My Posh, Zoxide, FZF, 7-Zip, Terminal-Icons, PSReadLine, PSFzf) from their official sources. It does not phone home, does not collect telemetry, and does not modify anything outside your user profile. It backs up your existing profile before overwriting it. That said, you should always review a script before running it, especially on a work machine.

Does it work on PowerShell Core on Linux or macOS?

No. Istar Pack relies on Scoop, which is Windows-only. On Linux or macOS, use your system package manager to install the equivalent tools (oh-my-posh, zoxide, fzf) and configure your shell manually.

Can I run it multiple times?

Yes. Istar Pack is idempotent. Running it again detects what is already installed and skips the work. This makes it safe to use as a "repair" tool when something has gone wrong.

Can I use my own theme?

Not directly through the Istar Pack UI. The script ships six curated themes. To use a custom theme, run Istar Pack once with any theme to set up the profile scaffolding, then manually replace the <ThemeKey>.omp.json file in your profile directory with your own JSON. Edit the oh-my-posh line in your profile to point at the new file name.

Why is the script a single file?

Because the goal is one-shot setup. A single .ps1 file is easy to download, easy to audit, and easy to share. There are no module dependencies, no install scripts, no build step. Download, run, done.

How do I update Istar Pack?

Re-download the .ps1 file from this repository and replace your local copy. Your settings and backups in $HOME\.istar-pack\ are preserved. Run the script again to update your profile and theme JSON to the latest version.

Contributing

Contributions are welcome. Please read CONTRIBUTING.md for the workflow, code style, and pull request process.

The short version:

Fork the repository.
Create a feature branch (git checkout -b feature/my-feature).
Make your changes. Keep the single-file structure of Istar-Pack.ps1 intact.
Test on both PowerShell 5.1 and PowerShell 7 if possible.
Open a pull request with a clear description of what changed and why.

Bug reports and feature requests should be filed via the Issues tab. Use the provided issue templates so we have the information needed to reproduce or evaluate.

Changelog

See CHANGELOG.md for the full version history.

Project Layout

istar-pack/
├── Istar-Pack.ps1              # The single-file deliverable.
├── README.md                   # This document.
├── CHANGELOG.md                # Version history.
├── CONTRIBUTING.md             # How to contribute.
├── .gitignore                  # PowerShell / Windows gitignore.
├── .github/
│   ├── ISSUE_TEMPLATE/
│   │   ├── bug_report.md       # Bug report template.
│   │   └── feature_request.md  # Feature request template.
│   └── workflows/
│       └── validate.yml        # CI: PowerShell syntax check on push.
└── docs/
    └── FILES.md                # Detailed repo layout reference.

See docs/FILES.md for a description of every file and folder in this repository.

Disclaimer

This script modifies your PowerShell profile and installs third-party software. While it backs up your existing profile before overwriting it, you are responsible for reviewing the script before running it. The maintainers are not liable for any data loss, system instability, or other damage arising from the use of this software.

No license is currently attached to this repository. Until a license is added, default copyright law applies: you may read and fork the code for personal review, but redistribution or commercial use requires explicit permission from the maintainer.

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Repository files navigation

Istar Pack

Table of Contents

Why Istar Pack

Features

Requirements

Quick Start

How It Works

Themes

Configuration

File Locations

Settings Options

Command-Line Switches

What Gets Installed

What the Profile Fixes

Uninstall and Rollback

Troubleshooting

The TUI looks broken (weird characters, misaligned boxes)

The banner is cut off at the bottom

`Set-ExecutionPolicy` errors when launching

Oh My Posh shows "command not found" after install

The script fails with an encoding error on PS 5.1

`7z` is reported as missing even after install

I want to reset everything to defaults

FAQ

Contributing

Changelog

Project Layout

Disclaimer

About

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Contributors

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.github		.github
docs		docs
.gitignore		.gitignore
CHANGELOG.md		CHANGELOG.md
CONTRIBUTING.md		CONTRIBUTING.md
Istar-Pack.ps1		Istar-Pack.ps1
README.md		README.md

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Repository files navigation

Istar Pack

Table of Contents

Why Istar Pack

Features

Requirements

Quick Start

How It Works

Themes

Configuration

File Locations

Settings Options

Command-Line Switches

What Gets Installed

What the Profile Fixes

Uninstall and Rollback

Troubleshooting

The TUI looks broken (weird characters, misaligned boxes)

The banner is cut off at the bottom

Set-ExecutionPolicy errors when launching

Oh My Posh shows "command not found" after install

The script fails with an encoding error on PS 5.1

7z is reported as missing even after install

I want to reset everything to defaults

FAQ

Contributing

Changelog

Project Layout

Disclaimer

About

Topics

Resources

Contributing

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Stars

Watchers

Forks

Releases 1

Contributors

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Languages

`Set-ExecutionPolicy` errors when launching

`7z` is reported as missing even after install