In the Windows environment, it is crucial to keep the operating system up to date with the latest security patches and hotfixes. The "wmic" command, short for Windows Management Instrumentation Command-line, provides a powerful way to interact with the Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) and retrieve various system information. One useful application of the "wmic" command is to retrieve information about installed Windows updates, including the HotFixID and installation date.

Examples: To retrieve the HotFixID and installation date of installed Windows updates, open the Command Prompt or PowerShell and run the following command:

wmic /namespace:\\root\cimv2 path Win32_QuickFixEngineering get HotFixID,InstalledOn /format:list

This command queries the WMI namespace "root\cimv2" and retrieves the HotFixID and InstalledOn properties from the Win32_QuickFixEngineering class. The output is formatted in a list format, making it easier to read and analyze.

The result will include a list of installed Windows updates, each with its corresponding HotFixID and installation date. For example:

HotFixID=KB123456
InstalledOn=20211201

This indicates that the update with HotFixID "KB123456" was installed on December 1, 2021.