I have a fairly simple PS script that was working perfectly, and now has suddenly started giving errors. I have narrowed the problem portion to a couple of Get-Content statements. Here's what the affected part of the script looks like:
$pathSource = "D:\FileDirectory"
Set-Location -Path $pathSource
Get-Content -Encoding UTF8 -Path FilesA*.txt | Out-File -Encoding ASCII FilesA_Digest.txt
Get-Content -Encoding UTF8 -Path FilesB*.txt | Out-File -Encoding ASCII FilesB_Digest.txt
This part of the script gathers up a collection of like-named files and concatenates them into a single text file for uploading to an FTP site. The Get-Content/Out-File was needed as the original files are encoded incorrectly for the FTP site. The script was working perfectly, running once each night for several weeks. Now, it gets the following error when the Get-Content statements are reached:
Get-Content : A parameter cannot be found that matches parameter name 'Encoding'.
At D:\FileDirectory\Script.ps1
Environment is Windows Server 2016. I've tried different variations on the Get-Content parameters, but nothing has worked. I know there is a bug that affects network-mapped drives, but that's not the case here -- all files are local.
Any ideas/suggestions?
The only plausible explanation I can think of is that a custom Get-Content command that lacks an -Encoding parameter is shadowing (overriding) the standard Get-Content cmdlet in the PowerShell session that's executing your script.
To demonstrate:
# Define a custom Get-Content command (function) that accepts only
# a (positional) -Path parameter, not also -Encoding.
function Get-Content { [CmdletBinding()] param([string] $Path) }
# Now try to use Get-Content -Encoding
Get-Content -Encoding Utf8 FilesA*.txt
You'll see the same error message as in your question.
Use Get-Command Get-Content -All to see all commands named Get-Content, with the effective command listed first.
Then examine where any custom commands may come from; e.g., your $PROFILE script may contain one.
To rule out $PROFILE as the culprit, start PowerShell without loading the profile script and examine Get-Content then:
powershell -noprofile # Windows PowerShell
pwsh -noprofile # PowerShell Core
A simple way to rule out custom overrides ad hoc is to call a command by its module-qualified name:
Microsoft.Powershell.Management\Get-Content ...
You can determine a built-in cmdlet's module name of origin as follows:
PS> (Get-Command Get-Content -All)[-1].ModuleName
Microsoft.PowerShell.Management
In a pinch you can also infer the originating module name from the URL of the help topic:
Googling Get-Content will take you to https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/powershell/module/microsoft.powershell.management/get-content - note how the cmdlet's module name, microsoft.powershell.management (case doesn't matter), is the penultimate (next to last) URI component.
It seems an issue with the out command. Can you please try below code :
$pathSource = "D:\FileDirectory"
Set-Location -Path $pathSource
Get-Content -Encoding UTF8 -Path FilesA*.txt | Set-Content -Encoding ASCII -path FilesA_Digest.txt
Get-Content -Encoding UTF8 -Path FilesB*.txt | Set-Content -Encoding ASCII -path FilesB_Digest.txt
Well, I don't know why it failed, but I can say that I have completely re-written the script and now it works. I have to note that, given the errors that were occurring, I also don't know why it is now working.
I am using the exact same calls to the Get-Content commandlet, with the -Encoding parameter and the pipe to Out-File with its own -Encoding parameter. I am doing the exact same actions as the previous version of the script. The only part that is significantly different is the portion that performs the FTP transfer of the processed files. I'm now using only PowerShell to perform the transfer rather than CuteFTP and it all seems to be working correctly.
Thanks to everyone who contributed.
Cheers
Norm
Not sure if it helps, but I was running into the same with:
$n = ni '[hi]' -value 'some text'
gc $n -Encoding Byte
$f = ls *hi*
$f.where{$_.name -eq '[hi]'}.Delete()
also looks like there's already a chain of SOs about this known bug see this answer
Related
I've got a Powershell script that takes a filename as input.
param([string]$folder, [string]$input_filename)
$logfile=$folder + "\duplicate.log"
Write-Output "`nScript: `n$transformation_filename`nLogfile: " | Out-file $logfile -Append
This works fine for most filenames, but it breaks down when the filename or folder name contains [].
dupfile.ps1 "C:\foldername [w]" "filename.xml"
Line 3 throws this error:
Cannot perform operation because the wildcard path C:foldername [w]\duplicate.log did not resolve to a file.
So the variables have to be treated more literally.
$logfile='$folder' + "\duplicate.log"
Nope, that's too literal.
$logfile="$folder" + "\duplicate.log"
Nope, same error.
How can I tell Powershell to insert the variable value but don't try to interpret anything in that value as wildcards?
Edit: I'm using Powershell 5.
My dupfile.ps1 contains only the 3 lines above.
Using this from the PS shell to run the script:
C:_SCRIPTS_\dupfile.ps1 "C:\foldername [w]" "test.txt"
One more addition, if I may. I have a few lines that redirect their error messages to the logfile.
Copy-Item -LiteralPath $inputPath -Destination $outputPath 2>&1|%{ "$_" } >>$logfile
The redirection trips over the [] again. I don't think I can use -LiteralPath here.
tl;dr
To ensure that file-path argument $var in redirection operations > $var / >> $var is treated literally if it contains [ and ], use
| Out-File -LiteralPath $var / | Out-File -LiteralPath $var -Append instead.
Copy-Item -LiteralPath $inputPath -Destination $outputPath 2>&1 |
ForEach-Object { "$_" } |
Out-File -LiteralPath $logfile # literal alternative to >> $logfile
As in your case, you may have to combine it with a redirection in order to ensure that additional streams beside the success output stream are targeted:
# Literal equivalent of *>> $logfile
... *>&1 | Out-File -LiteralPath $logfile -Append
Unfortunately, it gets tricky with capturing a given other stream only, as you then need to use the appropriate -*Variable common parameter, such as the common -ErrorVariable parameter:
# Literal equivalent of 2>> $logfile
... -ErrorVariable errs
$errs | Out-File -LiteralPath $logfile -Append
Caveat:
It is tempting to try to bypass the above solutions by escaping the literal path so that when it is interpreted as a wildcard, it is treated literally, using [WildcardPattern]::Escape().
However, this does not work as expected as of PowerShell 7.2.6, because the escaped form of the literal path is then used as the literal file path - see GitHub issue #9475 and also the discussion about whether > / >>, ... should treat their arguments as wildcards to begin with.
# !! Arguably SHOULD work, but doesn't as of 7.2.6:
# The file that is created is LITERALLY named for the ESCAPED form:
# `[1`].txt
'hi' > ([WildcardPattern]::Escape('[1].txt'))
Background information:
The -Path (-FilePath) parameter of PowerShell's provider cmdlets expects wildcard expressions for targeting file-system items by a name or path pattern. This parameter is implicitly targeted by the first positional argument, i.e. if you don't explicitly name the target parameter - e.g., Get-ChildItem foo is implicitly the same as Get-ChildItem -Path foo.
Surprisingly, this doesn't just apply to file-reading cmdlets (e.g., Get-ChildItem, Get-Content), but also to file-writing cmdlets (e.g., Set-Content, Out-File).
Note that the parameter named -Path is called -FilePath in Out-File for historical reasons. In PowerShell (Core) 7+, -Path was introduced as an alias name, for consistency.
Arguably, in file-writing/creating cmdlets this behavior is inappropriate - given that you usually know exactly what literal path you want to target - and there are several GitHub issues discussing this; an overview of all relevant discussions can be found in this comment on GitHub issue #17106.
In order for such arguments to be treated literally (verbatim), you must
use the -LiteralPath parameter instead.
In effect, > $var and >> $var are aliases for | Out-File -FilePath $var and | Out-File -FilePath $var -Append, which implies that $var is interpreted as a wildcard.
Using explicit Out-File calls with -LiteralPath, as shown at the top, avoids this problem.
I have a script that merges files and that works fine - but characters like åäö looks not good in the output file
Here is the complete script:
$startOfToday = (Get-Date).Date
Get-ChildItem "C:\TEST -include *.* -Recurse |
Where-Object LastWriteTime -gt $startOfToday | ForEach-Object {gc $_; ""} |
Out-File "C:\$(Get-Date -Format 'yyyy/mm/dd').txt"
In the files in looks like this for example
Order ID 1
Order ID 2
This is för får
In the output it gets like this for the last row
Order ID 1
Order ID 2
får för fär
is there a way to make those characters appear in the output file as they appear in the first file?
The implication is that your input files are UTF-8-encoded without a BOM, which in Windows PowerShell are (mis)interpreted to be ANSI-encoded (using the system's active ANSI code page, such as Windows-1252).
The solution is to tell gc (Get-Content) explicitly what encoding to use, via the -Encoding parameter:
Get-ChildItem C:\TEST -include *.* -Recurse |
Where-Object LastWriteTime -gt $startOfToday |
ForEach-Object { Get-Content -Encoding Utf8 $_; ""} |
Out-File "C:\$(Get-Date -Format 'yyyy/mm/dd').txt"
Note that PowerShell never preserves the input encoding automatically, therefore, in the absence of using -Encoding with Out-File, its default encoding is used, which is "Unicode" (UTF-16LE) in Windows PowerShell.
While PowerShell (Core) 7+ also doesn't preserve input encodings, it consistently defaults to BOM-less UTF-8, so your original code would work as-is there.
For more information about default encodings in Windows PowerShell vs. PowerShell (Core) 7+, see this answer.
Note: As AdminOfThings suggests in a comment, simply replacing Out-File with Set-Content in your original code also works in this particular case, because the same misinterpretation of the encoding is then performed on both in- and output, and the data is simply being passed through. This isn't a general solution, however, notably not if you need to process the strings in memory first, before saving them to a file.
I'm new to scripting and I am trying to write the information returned about a VM to a text file. My script looks like this:
Connect-VIServer -Server 192.168.255.255 -Protocol https -User xxxx -Password XXXXXX
Get-VM -Name xxxxxx
Get-VM xxxxx | Get-HardDisk | Select Parent, Name, Filename, DiskType, Persistence | FT -AutoSize
Out-File -FilePath C:Filepath
I am able to connect to the VM, retrieve the HDD info and see it in the console. The file is created where I want it and is correctly named. No data is ever put into the file. I have tried Tee-Object with the same results. I've also tried the -append switch. I did see a post about the data being returned as an array and Powershell is not able to move the data from an array to a string. Do I need to create a variable to hold the returned data and write to file from there?
Thanks
Guenther Schmitz' answer is effective, but it's worth explaining why:
Your Out-File -FilePath C:Filepath is a stand-alone command that receives no input.
An Out-File call with no input simply creates an empty file (0 bytes).
In order for cmdlets such as Out-File to receive input from (an)other command(s) (represented as ... below), you must use the pipeline, which means that you must place a | after the input command(s) and follow it with your Out-File call:Note that I'm using the shorter -Path parameter alias for the less commonly used -FilePath[1]
... | Out-File -Path C:Filepath
In the simplest case, as above, the entire command (pipeline) is placed on the same line; if you want to spread it across multiple lines for readability, you have have two choices:
Put a line break immediately after |, which tells PowerShell that the command continues on the next line:
... |
Out-File -Path C:Filepath
End a line with an explicit line continuation, which means placing ` at the very end of a line:
... `
| Out-File -Path C:Filepath
Alternatively, since you're using Out-File with its default behavior, you could use >, an output redirection, instead:
... > C:Filepath
A couple of asides:
Using Out-File with something other than strings, and using Format-* cmdlets in general, means that the output is only suitable for display (human consumption), not for further programmatic processing.
If you want to send output to both the console and a file, use the Tee-Object cmdlet, as TobyU suggests:
... | Tee-Object -Path C:Filepath
[1] Strictly speaking, -LiteralPath is the best choice in this case, because -Path interprets its arguments as wildcard expressions. However, omitting -Path, i.e. specifying the file path as a positional argument, as is common, implicitly binds to -Path.
try this:
Get-VM xxxxx |
Get-HardDisk |
Select Parent, Name, Filename, DiskType, Persistence |
Out-File -FilePath C:\Filepath
I'm new to scripting and I am trying to write the information returned about a VM to a text file. My script looks like this:
Connect-VIServer -Server 192.168.255.255 -Protocol https -User xxxx -Password XXXXXX
Get-VM -Name xxxxxx
Get-VM xxxxx | Get-HardDisk | Select Parent, Name, Filename, DiskType, Persistence | FT -AutoSize
Out-File -FilePath C:Filepath
I am able to connect to the VM, retrieve the HDD info and see it in the console. The file is created where I want it and is correctly named. No data is ever put into the file. I have tried Tee-Object with the same results. I've also tried the -append switch. I did see a post about the data being returned as an array and Powershell is not able to move the data from an array to a string. Do I need to create a variable to hold the returned data and write to file from there?
Thanks
Guenther Schmitz' answer is effective, but it's worth explaining why:
Your Out-File -FilePath C:Filepath is a stand-alone command that receives no input.
An Out-File call with no input simply creates an empty file (0 bytes).
In order for cmdlets such as Out-File to receive input from (an)other command(s) (represented as ... below), you must use the pipeline, which means that you must place a | after the input command(s) and follow it with your Out-File call:Note that I'm using the shorter -Path parameter alias for the less commonly used -FilePath[1]
... | Out-File -Path C:Filepath
In the simplest case, as above, the entire command (pipeline) is placed on the same line; if you want to spread it across multiple lines for readability, you have have two choices:
Put a line break immediately after |, which tells PowerShell that the command continues on the next line:
... |
Out-File -Path C:Filepath
End a line with an explicit line continuation, which means placing ` at the very end of a line:
... `
| Out-File -Path C:Filepath
Alternatively, since you're using Out-File with its default behavior, you could use >, an output redirection, instead:
... > C:Filepath
A couple of asides:
Using Out-File with something other than strings, and using Format-* cmdlets in general, means that the output is only suitable for display (human consumption), not for further programmatic processing.
If you want to send output to both the console and a file, use the Tee-Object cmdlet, as TobyU suggests:
... | Tee-Object -Path C:Filepath
[1] Strictly speaking, -LiteralPath is the best choice in this case, because -Path interprets its arguments as wildcard expressions. However, omitting -Path, i.e. specifying the file path as a positional argument, as is common, implicitly binds to -Path.
try this:
Get-VM xxxxx |
Get-HardDisk |
Select Parent, Name, Filename, DiskType, Persistence |
Out-File -FilePath C:\Filepath
I am trying to replicate the functionality of the cat command in Unix.
I would like to avoid solutions where I explicitly read both files into variables, concatenate the variables together, and then write out the concatenated variable.
Simply use the Get-Content and Set-Content cmdlets:
Get-Content inputFile1.txt, inputFile2.txt | Set-Content joinedFile.txt
You can concatenate more than two files with this style, too.
If the source files are named similarly, you can use wildcards:
Get-Content inputFile*.txt | Set-Content joinedFile.txt
Note 1: PowerShell 5 and older versions allowed this to be done more concisely using the aliases cat and sc for Get-Content and Set-Content respectively. However, these aliases are problematic because cat is a system command in *nix systems, and sc is a system command in Windows systems - therefore using them is not recommended, and in fact sc is no longer even defined as of PowerShell Core (v7). The PowerShell team recommends against using aliases in general.
Note 2: Be careful with wildcards - if you try to output to inputFiles.txt (or similar that matches the pattern), PowerShell will get into an infinite loop! (I just tested this.)
Note 3: Outputting to a file with > does not preserve character encoding! This is why using Set-Content is recommended.
Do not use >; it messes up the character encoding. Use:
Get-Content files.* | Set-Content newfile.file
In cmd, you can do this:
copy one.txt+two.txt+three.txt four.txt
In PowerShell this would be:
cmd /c copy one.txt+two.txt+three.txt four.txt
While the PowerShell way would be to use gc, the above will be pretty fast, especially for large files. And it can be used on on non-ASCII files too using the /B switch.
You could use the Add-Content cmdlet. Maybe it is a little faster than the other solutions, because I don't retrieve the content of the first file.
gc .\file2.txt| Add-Content -Path .\file1.txt
To concat files in command prompt it would be
type file1.txt file2.txt file3.txt > files.txt
PowerShell converts the type command to Get-Content, which means you will get an error when using the type command in PowerShell because the Get-Content command requires a comma separating the files. The same command in PowerShell would be
Get-Content file1.txt,file2.txt,file3.txt | Set-Content files.txt
I used:
Get-Content c:\FileToAppend_*.log | Out-File -FilePath C:\DestinationFile.log
-Encoding ASCII -Append
This appended fine. I added the ASCII encoding to remove the nul characters Notepad++ was showing without the explicit encoding.
If you need to order the files by specific parameter (e.g. date time):
gci *.log | sort LastWriteTime | % {$(Get-Content $_)} | Set-Content result.log
You can do something like:
get-content input_file1 > output_file
get-content input_file2 >> output_file
Where > is an alias for "out-file", and >> is an alias for "out-file -append".
Since most of the other replies often get the formatting wrong (due to the piping), the safest thing to do is as follows:
add-content $YourMasterFile -value (get-content $SomeAdditionalFile)
I know you wanted to avoid reading the content of $SomeAdditionalFile into a variable, but in order to save for example your newline formatting i do not think there is proper way to do it without.
A workaround would be to loop through your $SomeAdditionalFile line by line and piping that into your $YourMasterFile. However this is overly resource intensive.
To keep encoding and line endings:
Get-Content files.* -Raw | Set-Content newfile.file -NoNewline
Note: AFAIR, whose parameters aren't supported by old Powershells (<3? <4?)
I think the "powershell way" could be :
set-content destination.log -value (get-content c:\FileToAppend_*.log )