Parsing Text file and placing contents into an Array Powershell

Question

I am looking for a way to parse a text file and place the results into an array in powershell.

I know select-string -path -pattern will get all strings that match a pattern. But what if I already have a structured textfile, perhaps pipe delimminated, with new entries on each line. Like so:

prodServ1a prodServ1b prodServ1c

C:\dir\serverFile.txt

How can I place each of those servers into an array in powershell that I can loop through?

TessellatingHeckler · Accepted Answer · 2014-07-15 18:44:49Z

5

You say 'pipe delimited, like so' but your example isn't pipe delimited. I'll imagine it is, then you need to use the Import-CSV commandlet. e.g. if the data file contains this:

prodServ1a|4|abc
prodServ1b|5|def
prodServ1c|6|ghi

then this code:

$data = Import-Csv -Path test.dat -Header "Product","Cost","SerialNo" -Delimiter "|"

will import and split it, and add headers:

$data

Product                    Cost                       SerialNo
-------                    ----                       --------
prodServ1a                 4                          abc
prodServ1b                 5                          def
prodServ1c                 6                          ghi

Then you can use

foreach ($item in $data) {
    $item.SerialNo
}

edited Jul 15, 2014 at 18:44

answered Jul 15, 2014 at 18:35

TessellatingHeckler

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3 Comments

TessellatingHeckler Over a year ago

Edit: I missed the important -Delimiter bit that makes it work with the pipe character! Updated.

SoftwareSavant Over a year ago

Quick question, is there a way to anonymously get the strings from item object? I have tried $item[n] and $item.fieldn, while the latter didnt' through me an exception It still didn't work. I am assuming if I add headers to the import command, that is what it is expecting?

TessellatingHeckler Over a year ago

@DmainEvent I do not know of a way, and cannot find one with quick looking. I recommend you post a new question and other people can see it too. (But as a side comment, you must have headers as the first line in the file, or using Import-CSV -Header ..., otherwise it will take the first line of the file as header names and you will miss that row of data).

SparksFlyn · Accepted Answer · 2017-04-13 19:22:28Z

1

If your data is flat or unstructured, but has a pattern such as delimited by a space or comma and no carriage returns or line feeds, you can use the Split() method.

PS>$data = "prodServ1a prodServ1b prodServ1c"

PS>$data
prodServ1a prodServ1b prodServ1c

PS>$data.Split(" ")
prodServ1a
prodServ1b
prodServ1c

Works particularly well with someone sending you a list of IP addresses separated by a comma.

answered Apr 13, 2017 at 19:22

SparksFlyn

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