Unexpected array to string conversion

Question

I'm trying to pack my data into objects before displaying them with ConvertTo-Json. The test case below shows perfectly how I'm dealing with data and what problem occurs:

$array = @("a","b","c")
$data = @{"sub" = @{"sub-sub" = $array}}
$output = @{"root" = $data}
ConvertTo-Json -InputObject $data
ConvertTo-Json -InputObject $output

Output (formatted by hand for clarity):

          { "sub": { "sub-sub": [ "a", "b", "c" ] }}
{ "root": { "sub": { "sub-sub": "a b c" } }}

Is there any way to assign $data to $output without this weird implicit casting?

Thank you! ...although -Depth 1 gives System.Collections.Hashtable for "sub-sub" but -Depth 2 gives "a b c" for ["a","b","c"] instead of Object[] and I think this is very illogical — Bálint Juhász
– Bálint Juhász, Commented Apr 10, 2016 at 8:39
Depth is simply the number of nested levels at which PowerShell will "unravel" a value. Otherwise, it'll default to the objects string representation, which is exactly what yo see — Mathias R. Jessen
– Mathias R. Jessen, Commented Apr 10, 2016 at 8:41
And by string representation you mean "[string]" and not "... | Out-String". Now it's clear. — Bálint Juhász
– Bálint Juhász, Commented Apr 10, 2016 at 8:57

Mathias R. Jessen · Accepted Answer · 2016-04-10 11:14:05Z

5

As mentioned in the comments, ConvertTo-Json will try to flatten the object structure beyond a maximum nesting level, or depth, by converting whatever object it finds beyond that depth to a string.

The default depth is 2, but you can specify that it should go deeper with the Depth parameter:

PS C:\> @{root=@{level1=@{level2=@("level3-1","level3-2")}}}|ConvertTo-Json
{
    "root":  {
        "level1":  {
            "level2":  "level3-1 level3-2"
        }
    }
}
PS C:\> @{root=@{level1=@{level2=@("level3-1","level3-2")}}}|ConvertTo-Json -Depth 3
{
    "root":  {
        "level1":  {
            "level2":  [
                "level3-1",
                "level3-2"
            ]
        }
    }
}

answered Apr 10, 2016 at 11:14

Mathias R. Jessen

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