How can I hide the progress display of Invoke-WebRequest? I do a lot of successive requests and have my own Write-Progress display that I use, so I don't need the built-in one popping up underneath it every time.
I use the mshtml results (the IE COM object) that are created from the result of Invoke-WebRequest automatically, so I can't switch to a WebClient or something like that, unless someone provides instructions on how to get an mshtml object from a WebClient request.
Use the $progressPreference variable. It should have a value of 'Continue' by default unless you've edited it elsewhere, which tells Powershell to display the progress bar. Since you mentioned that you have your own custom progress displays, I would reset it immediately after the cmdlet is executed. For example:
$ProgressPreference = 'SilentlyContinue' # Subsequent calls do not display UI.
Invoke-WebRequest ...
$ProgressPreference = 'Continue' # Subsequent calls do display UI.
Write-Progress ...
More info on preference variables at about_preference_variables. Here's the entry for $ProgressPreference:
$ProgressPreference
-------------------
Determines how Windows PowerShell responds to progress updates
generated by a script, cmdlet or provider, such as the progress bars
generated by the Write-Progress cmdlet. The Write-Progress cmdlet
creates progress bars that depict the status of a command.
Valid values:
Stop: Does not display the progress bar. Instead,
it displays an error message and stops executing.
Inquire: Does not display the progress bar. Prompts
for permission to continue. If you reply
with Y or A, it displays the progress bar.
Continue: Displays the progress bar and continues with
(Default) execution.
SilentlyContinue: Executes the command, but does not display
the progress bar.