PowerShell Tip of the Week<\/b><\/a> that GD referred to is for.)<\/p>\nThe problem GD has is that he\u2019s getting output that looks like this:<\/p>\n
37.222378\n5421.1991\n3.2\n<\/pre>\nAs you can see, that output is a bit difficult to decipher, especially at first glance. What GD would like<\/i> to get is output that looks like this, with leading zeroes that ensure that the decimal places line up nice and neat:<\/p>\n00037.222378\n05421.1991\n00003.2\n<\/pre>\nHow\u2019s he supposed to do that? Well, here\u2019s one suggestion:<\/p>\n
$a = 37.222378\n$a.ToString(\"00000.00\")\n$b = 5421.1991\n$b.ToString(\"00000.00\")\n$c = 3.2\n$c.ToString(\"00000.00\")\n<\/pre>\nGood question: what are<\/i> we doing here? Well, the first line should be fairly straightforward; all we\u2019re doing there is assigning the value 37.222378 to the variable $a. And the second line really isn\u2019t all that difficult, either: in that line we\u2019re using the ToString<\/b> method to display the value of $a as a string. When we do that (display a number as a string), we can apply some standard formatting characters to the string as well. For this sample script, we want to do two things: 1) we want to display a maximum of 6 leading zeroes; and, 2) we want to display two decimal places. That\u2019s why we used the format string 000000.00<\/b>: the 000000<\/b> gives us six leading zeros (or, to be a little more precise, as many leading zeroes as we need in order to fill six digit spots) and the .00<\/b> gives us two decimal places.<\/p>\n
We then do the same thing for the values assigned to $b and $c. And what\u2019s our output going to look? It\u2019s going to look an awful lot like this:<\/p>\n
00037.22\n05421.20\n00003.20\n<\/pre>\nOf course, PowerShell being PowerShell, we also could have carried out this same task using a single command:<\/p>\n
($a = 37.222378, 5421.1991, 3.2) | ForEach-Object {$_.ToString(\"000000.00\")}\n<\/pre>\nIn this example we\u2019re simply assigning all three of our numeric values to an array named $a. We then pipe the value of $a to the ForEach-Object<\/b> cmdlet, asking ForEach-Object to use the ToString method to display the value of each item in the array, and to display these values using the 000000.00 format.<\/p>\n
And yes, that is<\/i> awfully nice of ForEach-Object to do that for us, isn\u2019t it?<\/p>\n
While we\u2019re on the subject, what if you wanted a fixed number of decimal places but didn\u2019t care about leading zeroes? Well, in that case you could always use a format string like this one:<\/p>\n
$a.ToString(\"#.000000\")\n<\/pre>\nHere we\u2019re using the #<\/b> sign to represent one or more digits, then using .000000<\/b> to represent six decimal places. What\u2019s $a going to look like when we run this command? It\u2019s going to look like this:<\/p>\n37.222378\n<\/pre>\nHere\u2019s another formatting string you might find useful:<\/p>\n
$a.ToString(\"#,###.00\")\n<\/pre>\nNotice the syntax here: #,###.00<\/b>. The #,### is going to use a comma as the thousands separator; in other words the value 1,000 is going to be displayed like this:<\/p>\n1,000.00\n<\/pre>\nAnd it doesn\u2019t matter how many thousands (or tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands or thousands of thousands) you might have; PowerShell will put in as many commas as needed. For example, take this little block of code:<\/p>\n
$a = 11366777.222378\n$a.ToString(\"#,###.00\")\n<\/pre>\nAs you can see, the value 11366777.222378 needs all sorts of commas in order to separate the thousands. That\u2019s fine; PowerShell will take care of that for you:<\/p>\n
11,366,777.22\n<\/pre>\nNow, what about using this approach in a calculated property? Well, as it turns out, that\u2019s no big deal:<\/p>\n
Get-ChildItem C:\\Scripts | Where-Object {$_.PsISContainer -eq $False } | \nSelect-Object Name, @{Name=\"Kbytes\";Expression={ ($_.Length \/ 1KB).ToString(\"00000.0\") } }\n<\/pre>\nAgain we\u2019re too lazy \u2013 um, too pressed for time to discuss calculated properties in any depth today. But take a look at our calculated property for displaying file sizes in kilobytes:<\/p>\n
@{Name=\"Kbytes\";Expression={ ($_.Length \/ 1KB).ToString(\"00000.0\") }\n<\/pre>\nIn this case we\u2019re taking the Length<\/b> (size, in bytes) of each file and dividing it by the numeric constant 1KB; that gives us the size of each file in bytes. We then take that value and display it using the ToString method, this time using 5 leading zeroes and a single decimal place:<\/p>\nToString(\"00000.0\")\n<\/pre>\nAnd what will that result in? This:<\/p>\n
Name Kbytes\n---- ------\nAverage.txt 00001.8\nbcdscripts.zip 00006.6\nbootmgr.vbs 00001.9\nctp2.txt 00035.1\nctp2_cmdlets.txt 00111.5\nhey0501.doc 00115.0\nmimic_bcdedit.vbs 00017.5\nMORPHEUS.TTF 00066.4\nos_info.vbs 00017.5\noutput.txt 00032.9\npool.mdb 00224.0\nPowerShellScriptOMaticCompiledRelease.exe 00430.6\n<\/pre>\nPretty nice, huh?<\/p>\n
But wait; there\u2019s more. Leading zeroes are nice, but it might be even nicer \u2013 at least in some cases \u2013 to have output that looks like this:<\/p>\n
37.22\n 5421.20\n 3.20\n<\/pre>\nIn other words, we\u2019d like to use \u201cleading blank spaces\u201d rather than leading zeroes. But is that even possible using out .NET formatting characters?<\/p>\n
To tell you the truth, we aren\u2019t sure; however, after a brief search we weren\u2019t able to come up with anything. But that\u2019s OK; instead, we came up with this:<\/p>\n
$a = 37.222378\n($a.ToString(\"#.00\")).PadLeft(10)\n$b = 5421.1991\n($b.ToString(\"#.00\")).PadLeft(10)\n$c = 3.2\n($c.ToString(\"#.00\")).PadLeft(10)\n<\/pre>\nThis time around we\u2019re doing \u201ctwo-step\u201d formatting. In step 1, we use the ToString method to convert the value of each variable to a formatted string, in this case a number (or set of numbers) followed by two decimal places:<\/p>\n
($a.ToString(\"#.00\"))\n<\/pre>\nNote that we placed this command in parentheses to ensure that PowerShell carried this out before doing anything else.<\/p>\n
Step 1 converts the value 37.222378 to this: 37.22. In step 2, we\u2019re going to use the PadLeft<\/b> method to insert enough blank spaces at the beginning of the string to ensure that the string fills up 10 character spaces. That makes $a equal to this:<\/p>\n 37.22\n<\/pre>\nAnd when we apply the same process to $b and $c we end up getting the \u201cleading blank spaces\u201d we were after:<\/p>\n
37.22\n 5421.20\n 3.20\n<\/pre>\nPretty slick, huh?<\/p>\n
That should do it, GD. If you have any other questions about Windows PowerShell, just stop by TechEd 2008 next week and we\u2019ll be happy to help you. As we noted, we\u2019ll be delivering a pair of instructor-led labs on Tuesday; we\u2019ll also be available after each session to answer questions and to chat about scripting. (Well, as far as we know we\u2019ll be available.) In addition, we\u2019ll be hanging out at the TechNet Magazine booth on Wednesday morning; if you get the chance, drop by and say hi.<\/p>\n
Oh, and don\u2019t forget about those new resources for the PowerShell Toolbox<\/b><\/a>. You say that, as much as you enjoy helping people, you need more motivation that just that? OK, how about this: we have a handful of Dr. Scripto bobbleheads lying around. Send us a suggestion by Friday morning at 8:00 AM, and we\u2019ll toss your name into a hat. When we get back from Orlando we\u2019ll draw names and award bobbleheads to 5 lucky souls. But you have to send us a suggestion for the PowerShell Toolbox by Friday morning to be eligible.<\/p>\nDeal? Deal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Hey, Scripting Guy! I just read your \u201cusing calculated properties\u201d PowerShell Tip of the Week, and it addresses a problem I recently had. However, when I got to the last step in your article, I realized the file sizes \u2013 and my displayed values \u2013 are now left-justified. I\u2019d like to use leading zeroes to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":595,"featured_media":87096,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[51,3,4,45],"class_list":["post-55443","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-scripting","tag-getting-started","tag-scripting-guy","tag-scripting-techniques","tag-windows-powershell"],"acf":[],"blog_post_summary":"
Hey, Scripting Guy! I just read your \u201cusing calculated properties\u201d PowerShell Tip of the Week, and it addresses a problem I recently had. However, when I got to the last step in your article, I realized the file sizes \u2013 and my displayed values \u2013 are now left-justified. I\u2019d like to use leading zeroes to […]<\/p>\n","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55443","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/595"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=55443"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55443\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/87096"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55443"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55443"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=55443"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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