CODEWITHSUNDEEP
powershell
mickyjtwin
mickyjtwin

Reputation: 4990

Create array of paths with spaces in powershell

I am trying to define an array of file paths that I can loop over and apply user permissions to. Some of these paths have spaces in them, and the way I'm trying to define the array variable, I cannot loop over them.

$rootSitePath = "C:\Path"

$paths = $rootSitePath + "\" + "Path1",
         $rootSitePath + "\" + "Path with spaces",
         $rootSitePath = "\" + "Path3"

foreach($path in $paths)
{
   #do stuff
}

Not sure if I need to escape in a certain way??

Upvotes: 1

Views: 8195

Answers (2)

manojlds
manojlds

Reputation: 301147

The array , operator has higher precedence than the + operator for concatentation.

So, if you do something like ( simplified example):

$paths = $rootSitePath+"\"+"Path1","path2"

$paths will be a string because it did string concatentation of $rootSitePath\ and Path1 path2 (string representation of the array "Path1", "path2") . So you have to say that the first part before the , is the first element:

$paths = ($rootSitePath+"\"+"Path1"),"path2"

So to solve your problem, enclose each element in parentheses. Apart from that, you are not having problems because your paths had spaces in them.

Upvotes: 1

mjbnz
mjbnz

Reputation: 683

No, you don't need to do anything special - but you do need to put parenthesis around the array items as you have them above. try:

$rootSitePath = "C:\Path"

$paths = ($rootSitePath + "\" + "Path1"),
         ($rootSitePath + "\" + "Path with spaces"),
         ($rootSitePath + "\" + "Path3")

foreach($path in $paths)
{
   get-childitem $path
}

Upvotes: 3

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