SharePoint Online: Find Who Created a List or Library using PowerShell
Requirement: Find Who has created a list or library in SharePoint Online.
Get Who has Created a Library in SharePoint Online:
If you want to find out who has created a SharePoint Online list or library: Sorry, There is no way from the SharePoint web user interface! You can’t get the “Created By” value anywhere. The ability to quickly find the creator of a SharePoint Online list or library can be a critical piece of troubleshooting or auditing information. So, PowerShell can help to find this information quickly!
SharePoint Online: Find Who Created a List using PowerShell
We don’t have a List.Author property exposed in CSOM yet. However, We can extract author information from SchemaXML of the list.
#Load SharePoint CSOM Assemblies
Add-Type -Path "C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Web Server Extensions\16\ISAPI\Microsoft.SharePoint.Client.dll"
Add-Type -Path "C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Web Server Extensions\16\ISAPI\Microsoft.SharePoint.Client.Runtime.dll"
#Function to call a non-generic method Load
Function Invoke-LoadMethod()
{
param([Microsoft.SharePoint.Client.ClientObject]$Object,[string]$PropertyName)
$ctx = $Object.Context
$load = [Microsoft.SharePoint.Client.ClientContext].GetMethod("Load")
$type = $Object.GetType()
$clientLoad = $load.MakeGenericMethod($type)
$Parameter = [System.Linq.Expressions.Expression]::Parameter(($type), $type.Name)
$Expression = [System.Linq.Expressions.Expression]::Lambda([System.Linq.Expressions.Expression]::Convert([System.Linq.Expressions.Expression]::PropertyOrField($Parameter,$PropertyName),[System.Object] ), $($Parameter))
$ExpressionArray = [System.Array]::CreateInstance($Expression.GetType(), 1)
$ExpressionArray.SetValue($Expression, 0)
$clientLoad.Invoke($ctx,@($Object,$ExpressionArray))
}
#Function to get user who created a SharePoint Online List or library
Function Get-SPOListAuthor($SiteURL,$ListName)
{
Try
{
#Get Credentials to connect
$Cred= Get-Credential
#Setup the context
$Ctx = New-Object Microsoft.SharePoint.Client.ClientContext($SiteURL)
$Ctx.Credentials = New-Object Microsoft.SharePoint.Client.SharePointOnlineCredentials($Cred.Username, $Cred.Password)
#Get the List
$List=$Ctx.Web.Lists.GetByTitle($ListName)
$Ctx.Load($List)
$Ctx.ExecuteQuery()
#Get List Schema XML
Invoke-LoadMethod -Object $List -PropertyName "SchemaXML"
$Ctx.ExecuteQuery()
#Extract Author from List Schema XML
$ListSchema = [xml] $List.SchemaXml
$AuthorID = $ListSchema.List.Author
$Author = $Ctx.web.GetUserById($AuthorID)
$Ctx.Load($Author)
$Ctx.ExecuteQuery()
Return $Author
}
Catch {
write-host -f Red "Error:" $_.Exception.Message
}
}
#Set Parameters
$SiteURL="https://Crescent.sharepoint.com"
$ListName="Documents"
Get-SPOListAuthor -SiteURL $SiteURL -ListName $ListName
Update: The recent version of CSOM exposes List.Author property through its API’s. So now it is possible to directly retrieve the author property of a SharePoint Online list. E.g.
#Load SharePoint CSOM Assemblies
Add-Type -Path "C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Web Server Extensions\16\ISAPI\Microsoft.SharePoint.Client.dll"
Add-Type -Path "C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Web Server Extensions\16\ISAPI\Microsoft.SharePoint.Client.Runtime.dll"
#Config Parameters
$SiteURL= "https://Crescent.sharepoint.com/sites/Marketing"
$ListName="Projects"
#Setup Credentials to connect
$Cred = Get-Credential
Try {
#Setup the context
$Ctx = New-Object Microsoft.SharePoint.Client.ClientContext($SiteURL)
$Ctx.Credentials = New-Object Microsoft.SharePoint.Client.SharePointOnlineCredentials($Cred.UserName,$Cred.Password)
#Get the List Author
$Web=$Ctx.Web
$List= $Web.Lists.GetByTitle($ListName)
$Ctx.Load($List)
$Ctx.Load($List.Author)
$Ctx.ExecuteQuery()
Write-host -f Green $List.Author.Email
}
Catch {
write-host -f Red "Error: " $_.Exception.Message
}
Find Who has Created a Document Library using PnP PowerShell
#Parameters
$SiteURL = "https://crescent.sharepoint.com/sites/marketing"
$ListName = "Branding"
#Connect to PnP Online
Connect-PnPOnline -Url $SiteURL -Interactive
#Get the List
$List = Get-PnPList -Identity $ListName -Includes Author
#Get the author of the list
$List.Author | Select Title, Email
