Best way to handle large amount of nested data in powershell? - powershell

Question

I'm trying to automate the logfiles verification of our daily batch.
I want to check around 20 servers that may have up to 30 batch, each batch can generate one or more logfiles and I want to validate them using several criteria.
So this ends up with a quite huge amount of data.
My first though was to use nested arrays and hashtables then create psobject like this :
$servers=#(
#{
"name"="server1";
"credential"="domain\user";
"batch"=#(
#{"batchName"="test";"path"="e:\cit\sauvegarde\batch\recup.cmd";"comment"="batch de test";"schedule"="lundi,mardi ";
"validations"=#(
#{"name"="log exist";"path"="\\smacweb\e$\cit\test.log";"filter"=#("NotNull";"NotOlderThan,2") };
#{"name"="no erros";"path"="\\smacweb\CIT\sauvegarde\logs\*.log";"filter"=#("NotContains,'error'") };
)};
#{"batchName"="mysql";"comment"="dump des bases mysql";"schedule"="lundi,mardi,vendredi";
"validations"=#(
#{"name"="log exist";"path"="\\smacweb\e$\mysqldump\dump.zip";"filter"=#("NotNull";"NotOlderThan,2") };
#{"name"="zipOK";"path"="\\smacweb\e$\mysqldump\dump.zip";"filter"=#("Test-Zip") };
)};
)
};
# #{
# "name"="server2";
# "credential"="domain\user2";
# "batch"=#(
# #{"batchName"=.....};
# )};
)
$srv=#()
$servers | % {
$srv+= New-Object -TypeName psobject -Property $_;
}
This is a small example but I guess it will quickly become hardly readable.
So what would be a better way to do this? Use xml (not familiar to me), use external database, other method?

Answer 1

Caution: I'm a noob when it comes to xml, but I gave it a try for fun. This is just an example of how you could navigate through the xml-file. :)
XML file (test.xml):
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<servers>
<server>
<servername>server1</servername>
<credential>domain\user</credential>
<batches>
<batch>
<batchname>test</batchname>
<batchpath>e:\cit\sauvegarde\batch\recup.cmd</batchpath>
<comment>batch de test</comment>
<schedule>
<day>lundi</day>
<day>mardi</day>
</schedule>
<validations>
<validation>
<name>log exist</name>
<path>\\smacweb\e$\cit\test.log</path>
<filters>
<filter>NotNull</filter>
<filter>NotOlderThan,2</filter>
</filters>
</validation>
<validation>
<name>no erros</name>
<path>\\smacweb\CIT\sauvegarde\logs\*.log</path>
<filters>
<filter>NotContains,'error'</filter>
</filters>
</validation>
</validations>
</batch>
<batch>
<batchname>mysql</batchname>
<comment>dump des bases mysql</comment>
<schedule>
<day>lundi</day>
<day>mardi</day>
<day>vendredi</day>
</schedule>
<validations>
<validation>
<name>log exist</name>
<path>\\smacweb\e$\mysqldump\dump.zip</path>
<filters>
<filter>NotNull</filter>
<filter>NotOlderThan,2</filter>
</filters>
</validation>
<validation>
<name>zipOK</name>
<path>\\smacweb\e$\mysqldump\dump.zip</path>
<filters>
<filter>Test-Zip</filter>
</filters>
</validation>
</validations>
</batch>
</batches>
</server>
</servers>
Powershell-script to loop through servers and batches:
function test {
$xml = [xml](Get-Content C:\Users\Frode\Desktop\test.xml)
$servers = $xml.SelectNodes("/servers/server")
foreach ($server in $servers) {
$batches = $server.SelectNodes("batches/batch")
Write-Host "Server: $($server.servername)"
foreach ($batch in $batches) {
Write-Host "Checking batch: $($batch.batchname)"
}
}
}
Output:
PS-ADMIN C:\Windows\system32> test
Server: server1
Checking batch: test
Checking batch: mysql