Convert numeric values to alternative values in Powershell

Question

I have two variables, $audience and $prodType that will hold value of 1-3 and 1-4 respectively. I'd like to build a table of sorts to convert the numeric values into words that a user can read and understand. For example, if $audience = '1' I would like the script to Write-Host "audience is set to New York" and if $prodType = '3', the script would Write-Host "prodType is set to Sandwiches".

I would like a cleaner way to do this then a series of elseif statements.

If($audience = '1'){
  Write-Host "audience is set to New York"
}
elseif($audience = '2'){
  Write-Host "audience is set to Los Angeles"
}

Can anyone help me build such a module?

Mathias R. Jessen · Accepted Answer · 2020-06-19 16:27:31Z

3

There's a number of ways to achieve this, but based on your scenario the easiest is with hashtables:

$audienceLocation = @{
  '1' = 'New York'
  '2' = 'Berlin'
  '3' = 'Beijing' 
}

$audience = '1'

Write-Host "audience is set to $($audienceLocation[$audience])"

In your case the input values are all strings - but if they were numerical and you didn't mind converting to a string label without spaces, an enum type would be an option as well.

Enums are just collections of string labels associated with some underlying integer, and can be converted in either direction with a simple cast:

enum AudienceLocation
{
  NewYork = 1
  Berlin  = 2
  Beijing = 3
}

$audience = 1
$location = [AudienceLocation]$audience

Write-Host "audience is set to $location"

The nice thing about an enum is that it's a proper type, so you can implicitly convert function input to a specific enum type parameter:

function Do-Something
{
  param([AudienceLocation]$Audience)

  Write-Host "audience is set to $Audience"
}

Do-Something -Audience 1 # will automatically turn `$Audience` into `'NewYork"` in a string

edited Jun 19, 2020 at 16:27

answered Jun 19, 2020 at 16:03

Mathias R. Jessen

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3 Comments

Garrett Over a year ago

Ah the @{} is what i needed. Does that function have a name?

Mathias R. Jessen Over a year ago

@Garrett That's a [hashtable] literal. Hash tables are basically unordered (and super-fast) dictionaries. Will update the answer with a link to documentation

Garrett Over a year ago

I've never used enum, going to keep this thread for future reference, looks super helpful. Thanks for all the great info!

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