CODEWITHSUNDEEP
regexstringpowershell
stukey
stukey

Reputation: 126

PowerShell Select-String regular expression to locate two strings on the same line

How do I use Select-String cmdlet to search a text file for a string which starts with a specific string, then contains random text and has another specific string towards the end of the line? I'm only interested in matches across a single line in the text file, not across the entire file.

For example I am searching to match both 'Set-QADUser' and 'WhatIf' on the same line in the file. And my example file contains the following line:

Set-QADUser -Identity $($c.ObjectGUID) -ObjectAttributes @{extensionattribute7=$ekdvalue} -WhatIf | Out-Null

How do I use Select-String along with a Regular Expression to locate the pattern in question? I tried using the following and it does work but it also matches other instances of either 'Set-QADUser' or 'WhatIf' found elsewhere in the text file and I only want to match instances when both search strings are found on the same line.

Select-String -path "test.ps1" -Pattern "Set-QADUser.*WhatIf" | Select Matches,LineNumber

To make this more complicated I actually want to perform this search from within the script file that is being searched. Effectively this is used to warn the user that the script being run is currently set to 'WhatIf' mode for testing. But of course the regEx matches the text from the actual Select-String cmd within the script when it's run - so it finds multiple matches and I can't figure out a very good way to overcome that issue. So far this is what I've got:

#Warn user about 'WhatIf' if detected
$line=Select-String -path $myinvocation.mycommand.name -Pattern "Set-QADUser.*WhatIf" | Select Matches,LineNumber
If ($line.Count -gt 1)
{
    Write-Host "******* Warning ******"
    Write-Host "Script is currently in 'WhatIf' mode; to make changes please remove '-WhatIf' parameter at line no. $($line[1].LineNumber)"
}

I'm sure there must be a better way to do this. Hope somebody can help.

Thanks

Upvotes: 0

Views: 1099

Answers (1)

mjolinor
mjolinor

Reputation: 68273

If you use the -Quiet switch on Select-String it will just return a boolean True/False, depending on whether it found a match or not.

-Quiet <SwitchParameter>
        Returns a Boolean value (true or false), instead of a MatchInfo object. The value is "true" if the pattern is found; otherwise, the value is "false".

        Required?                    false
        Position?                    named
        Default value                Returns matches
        Accept pipeline input?       false
        Accept wildcard characters?  false

Upvotes: 1

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