One of the more useful Windows features for Windows administrators is the Remote Server Administration Tools pack (RSAT).
Apart from allowing you to install GUI elements in the Administrative Tools menu, this can also install the command-line tools for querying and managing Active Directory: dsquery.exe, dsadd.exe, dsget.exe, dsmod.exe, dsmove.exe and dsrm.exe.
Note from Microsoft: You can install Remote Server Administration Tools for Windows 10 only on the full release of Windows 10 Professional or Windows 10 Enterprise.
The Windows 10 version can be used to manage Windows Server 2016, 2012 or 2008. It can be obtained here. In some cases you might need to update your server, as per here. After installing RSAT a reboot of the workstation will be needed. For completeness: A list of RSAT download locations for previous Windows versions, like 8.1 or older can be viewed here.
To manage features using the command line, use the dism command. This command can also be used to enable features on Windows servers.
The dism command also works if your no-brain domain administrator has used a policy to disable the Features management (“Turn Windows features on or off“) in the Programs and Features control panel. Of course, you do need to be a local administrator. That policy is stored in the registry at:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Programs
Name: NoWindowsFeatures
Type: DWORD
Change to 0 to enable the feature management
Here’s the reg command to disable this policy:
reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Programs /v NoWindowsFeatures /t REG_DWORD /d 0 /f
To list all the features available on a PC, and their state (disabled/enabled), use:
dism /online /get-features
For instance, to install the Telnet Client, use:
dism /online /enable-feature /featurename:TelnetClient
Or, if you need to print to an LPR printer on your network, you need to install the LPR port monitor:
dism /online /enable-feature /featurename:Printing-Foundation-LPRPortMonitor
Be aware that the feature names are case-sensitive. The /featurename parameter can be repeated multiple times, and some features have dependencies which need to be specified before them on the command line. The dism command will report failures because of dependencies, so you can build a correct command line by experimenting.
To install the Active Directory components from the RSAT tools pack, you need first to download and install the pack (duh). The following command will than install the AD tools, including the ds* command line tools:
dism /online /enable-feature /featurename:RSATClient-Roles-AD /featurename:RSATClient-Roles-AD-DS /featurename:RSATClient-Roles-AD-DS-SnapIns /featurename:RSATClient-Roles-AD-DS-AdministrativeCenter
Complete list of features
Available Windows 10 professional features (sorted by name):
Client-DeviceLockdown
Client-EmbeddedBootExp
Client-EmbeddedLogon
Client-EmbeddedShellLauncher
ClientForNFS-Infrastructure
Client-KeyboardFilter
Client-UnifiedWriteFilter
Containers
DataCenterBridging
DirectoryServices-ADAM-Client
DirectPlay
FaxServicesClientPackage
IIS-ApplicationDevelopment
IIS-ApplicationInit
IIS-ASP
IIS-ASPNET
IIS-ASPNET45
IIS-BasicAuthentication
IIS-CertProvider
IIS-CGI
IIS-ClientCertificateMappingAuthentication
IIS-CommonHttpFeatures
IIS-CustomLogging
IIS-DefaultDocument
IIS-DigestAuthentication
IIS-DirectoryBrowsing
IIS-FTPExtensibility
IIS-FTPServer
IIS-FTPSvc
IIS-HealthAndDiagnostics
IIS-HostableWebCore
IIS-HttpCompressionDynamic
IIS-HttpCompressionStatic
IIS-HttpErrors
IIS-HttpLogging
IIS-HttpRedirect
IIS-HttpTracing
IIS-IIS6ManagementCompatibility
IIS-IISCertificateMappingAuthentication
IIS-IPSecurity
IIS-ISAPIExtensions
IIS-ISAPIFilter
IIS-LegacyScripts
IIS-LegacySnapIn
IIS-LoggingLibraries
IIS-ManagementConsole
IIS-ManagementScriptingTools
IIS-ManagementService
IIS-Metabase
IIS-NetFxExtensibility
IIS-NetFxExtensibility45
IIS-ODBCLogging
IIS-Performance
IIS-RequestFiltering
IIS-RequestMonitor
IIS-Security
IIS-ServerSideIncludes
IIS-StaticContent
IIS-URLAuthorization
IIS-WebDAV
IIS-WebServer
IIS-WebServerManagementTools
IIS-WebServerRole
IIS-WebSockets
IIS-WindowsAuthentication
IIS-WMICompatibility
Internet-Explorer-Optional-amd64
LegacyComponents
MediaPlayback
Microsoft-Hyper-V
Microsoft-Hyper-V-All
Microsoft-Hyper-V-Hypervisor
Microsoft-Hyper-V-Management-Clients
Microsoft-Hyper-V-Management-PowerShell
Microsoft-Hyper-V-Services
Microsoft-Hyper-V-Tools-All
MicrosoftWindowsPowerShellV2
MicrosoftWindowsPowerShellV2Root
Microsoft-Windows-Subsystem-Linux
MSMQ-ADIntegration
MSMQ-Container
MSMQ-DCOMProxy
MSMQ-HTTP
MSMQ-Multicast
MSMQ-Server
MSMQ-Triggers
MSRDC-Infrastructure
MultiPoint-Connector
MultiPoint-Connector-Services
MultiPoint-Tools
NetFx3
NetFx4-AdvSrvs
NetFx4Extended-ASPNET45
NFS-Administration
Printing-Foundation-Features
Printing-Foundation-InternetPrinting-Client
Printing-Foundation-LPDPrintService
Printing-Foundation-LPRPortMonitor
Printing-PrintToPDFServices-Features
Printing-XPSServices-Features
RasCMAK
RasRip
ScanManagementConsole
SearchEngine-Client-Package
ServicesForNFS-ClientOnly
SimpleTCP
SMB1Protocol
SmbDirect
SNMP
TelnetClient
TFTP
TIFFIFilter
WAS-ConfigurationAPI
WAS-NetFxEnvironment
WAS-ProcessModel
WAS-WindowsActivationService
WCF-HTTP-Activation
WCF-HTTP-Activation45
WCF-MSMQ-Activation45
WCF-NonHTTP-Activation
WCF-Pipe-Activation45
WCF-Services45
WCF-TCP-Activation45
WCF-TCP-PortSharing45
Windows-Identity-Foundation
WindowsMediaPlayer
WMISnmpProvider
WorkFolders-Client
Xps-Foundation-Xps-Viewer
Available Remote Server Administration Tools features:
RSATClient
RSATClient-Features
RSATClient-Features-BitLocker
RSATClient-Features-Clustering
RSATClient-Features-GP
RSATClient-Features-IPAM
RSATClient-Features-LoadBalancing
RSATClient-Features-NetworkControllerTools
RSATClient-Features-NICTeaming
RSATClient-Features-ShieldedVMTools
RSATClient-Roles
RSATClient-Roles-AD
RSATClient-Roles-AD-DS
RSATClient-Roles-AD-DS-AdministrativeCenter
RSATClient-Roles-AD-DS-SnapIns
RSATClient-Roles-AD-Powershell
RSATClient-Roles-CertificateServices
RSATClient-Roles-CertificateServices-CA
RSATClient-Roles-CertificateServices-OnlineResponder
RSATClient-Roles-DamgmtTools
RSATClient-Roles-DHCP
RSATClient-Roles-DNS
RSATClient-Roles-FileServices
RSATClient-Roles-FileServices-Dfs
RSATClient-Roles-FileServices-FSRM-Management
RSATClient-Roles-FileServices-Nfs
RSATClient-Roles-FileServices-SR
RSATClient-Roles-RDS
RSATClient-Roles-RDS-Gateway
RSATClient-Roles-RDS-LicensingDiagUI
RSATClient-Roles-RDS-LicensingUI
RSATClient-Roles-RemoteAccessMgmtTools
RSATClient-Roles-RemoteAccessPowerShell
RSATClient-Roles-VA
RSATClient-Roles-WSUS
RSATClient-Roles-WSUS-API
RSATClient-Roles-WSUS-UI
RSATClient-ServerManager
This list can be obtained by running the following in PowerShell:
dism /online /get-features | ? { $_ -match "Feature " } | % { $_.substring(15) } | sort
Note: This article is an update of the older article for windows 7/8 which can be found here.