CODEWITHSUNDEEP
arrayspowershell
T Rose
T Rose

Reputation: 31

I don't understand why my array produces output I can't use

I am trying to create list of computers which I can work on using Get-Computer. Here are two ways to create the list. I don’t understand why they are different or how I can get the results of the two methods to have the same value.

My code is:

    $ComputerList1 = "WS7-HUR-MANAGER","WS7-HUR-NURSE"
    $ComputerList2 = Get-ADComputer -Filter {Name -like "WS7-HUR*"} | Select`   Name
    Get-Variable ComputerList1 | Select Name, Value
    Get-Variable ComputerList2 | Select Name, Value

The output:

Name              Value                                           
----              -----                                           
ComputerList1     {WS7-HUR-MANAGER, WS7-HUR-NURSE}                
ComputerList2     {@{Name=WS7-HUR-MANAGER}, @{Name=WS7-HUR-NURSE}}

Upvotes: 3

Views: 59

Answers (2)

Mark Wragg
Mark Wragg

Reputation: 23355

$ComputerList1 contains contains a string array object. $ComputerList2 contains a custom PowerShell object that was returned by Get-ADComputer and then filtered to only include it's Name property.

You can see the difference between the two by piping each to Get-Member.

$ComputerList1 | Get-Member
$ComputerList2 | Get-Member

Per the other answer you can use the -ExpandProperty switch of the Select-Object cmdlet to take one property of the object and return its contents as a new object of it's type. E.g if the property contained a string, you would then get a string object. E.g:

 $ComputerList2 = Get-ADComputer -Filter {Name -like "WS7-HUR*"} | Select ExpandProperty Name

Or you can also do this to access the property directly and assign it to a variable:

$ComputerList2 = (Get-ADComputer -Filter {Name -like "WS7-HUR*"}).Name

Upvotes: 3

Vincent K
Vincent K

Reputation: 1346

$ComputerList2 = Get-ADComputer -Filter {Name -like "WS7-HUR*"} | Select -ExpandProperty Name

Upvotes: 1

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