Add Item to a SharePoint List/Library using powershell with non-administrator credentials

Question

Is there a way to add Items to a SharePoint List/Library using the credentials of a non-administrator user?

I am logged on SharePoint server using the Admin account, I have users in my domain which I assigned the below permissions over my SharePoint Site Collection.

spadmin - Full Control - SP Administrator account
user1   - Design       - simple user
user2   - Contribute   - simple user

if I run Powershell as a different user using the user1 credentials, the current session opened on powershell is obviously for user1, after this I execute the next command:

$spweb = Get-SPWeb -Identity "http://misite-D02:36677/sites/SC_1"
$list = $spweb.Lists["Gen_List"]
$list.AddItem() #IT FAILS AT THIS LINE BECAUSE LIST IS NULL
$list["Title"] = "TestItem" 
$list.Update()

the above code fails on commented line, and when I print on screen the value of the list $spweb.Lists the next error is displayed:

The following exception occurred while trying to enumerate the collection: "Access is denied. (Exception from HRESULT: 0x80070005 (E_ACCESSDENIED))".
    + CategoryInfo          : NotSpecified: (:) [], ExtendedTypeSystemException
    + FullyQualifiedErrorId : ExceptionInGetEnumerator
    + PSComputerName        : misite-D02.testsp.local

My target is add items from PowerShell to lists, in order to have the "Modified By" and "Created By" columns recorded with the name of the user who created/modified them, such as is displayed in the below image:

it is possible do it with spadmin credentials, however I'm not sure with other user credentials or another way

Answer 1

You will need to grant the other two user accounts shell access using:

Add-SPShellAdmin [-UserName] <String> [-AssignmentCollection <SPAssignmentCollection>] [-Confirm [<SwitchParameter>]] [-database <SPDatabasePipeBind>] [-WhatIf [<SwitchParameter>]]

Most commonly, this would do:

Add-SPShellAdmin -UserName User1 -database Your_content_db_name

https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff607596.aspx

Answer 2

It fails because the user does not have shell access.

You could use the SharePoint REST API from PowerShell to work with the site/list/items.

From PowerShell, you can interact with the SharePoint endpoints.

Here is a SP2010 example I created where I'm validating users in a site. You'll want to look at the Lists.asmx service or other endpoint.

Import-Module ActiveDirectory

$webServ = "http://yoursite/_vti_bin/UserGroup.asmx"
$Service = New-WebServiceProxy -UseDefaultCredential -uri $webServ 
$Users = $Service.GetUserCollectionFromWeb().Users 
$UserNames = New-Object System.Collections.Generic.List[System.Object]
$notAd = New-Object System.Collections.Generic.List[System.Object]

$Users.User | ForEach-Object {
$spUser = $_.LoginName.Split('\')[1]

if($_.IsDomainGroup -eq $false)
{
    try
    {
        $adUser = Get-ADUser $spUSer
    }
    Catch
    {
        $ErrorMessage = $_.Exception.Message
        $notAd.Add($spUser)
    }
}
$UserNames.Add($spUser)
}

foreach($not in $notAd.ToArray())
{
Write-Host $not
}