Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) is the infrastructure for management data and operations on Windows-based operating systems. You can write WMI scripts or applications to automate administrative tasks on remote computers but WMI also supplies management data to other parts of the operating system and products, for example System Center Operations Manager, formerly Microsoft Operations Manager (MOM), or Windows Remote Management (WinRM).
Run-Time Requirements
WMI is preinstalled in Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008, Windows Server 2003, Windows XP, Windows Me, and Windows 2000.
Windows NT Workstation 4.0 SP4 and later: WMI is available through Add/Remove Windows Components in Control Panel, Add/Remove Programs, as WBEM option install. A later, more comprehensive version, WMI CORE 1.5 (Windows 95/98 and Windows NT 4.0), is available as a download from http://www.microsoft.com/downloads.Windows 98/95: WMI CORE 1.5 (Windows 95/98 and Windows NT 4.0) is available as a download from http://www.microsoft.com/downloads. This download requires Microsoft Internet Explorer version 5.0 or later.
For more information about which operating system is required to use a specific API element or WMI class, see the Requirements section of each topic in the WMI documentation.