To remove whitespace from strings in PowerShell, use .Trim() for spaces at the start and end, or -replace ‘\s’, ” to strip every space, tab and line break: Which one you need depends on whether the spaces inside the text matter. I tested every example in PowerShell 7 and Windows PowerShell 5.1, including the invisible … Read more
Inside a single-quoted string, you escape a single quote in PowerShell by typing it twice: ‘Sean O”Brien’. Or wrap the text in double quotes, where an apostrophe needs no escaping at all: Output: All three lines print the same name. Which one you pick depends on the bigger rule of PowerShell single vs double quotes: … Read more
To add a new line in a PowerShell string, put `n (backtick n) inside a double-quoted string. The text after it starts on the next line: Output: That covers most scripts. Below I show the other new line options, when each one matters, and how to turn spaces into new lines. I ran every example … Read more
To remove newlines from a string in PowerShell, replace them with the -replace operator and the pattern \r?\n, which matches both Windows and Unix line breaks: In this tutorial, I’ll show you how to remove newlines from a string in PowerShell and how to convert a multiline string to a single line without leftover spaces. … Read more
To check if an array is empty in PowerShell, test its Count property. An empty array has a Count of 0, and so does a variable that holds $null: The traps are $null on the wrong side, one-item arrays that look empty, and objects with no Count in Windows PowerShell 5.1. I’ll show where PowerShell … Read more
To filter objects between two dates with PowerShell Where-Object, compare the date property against a start and an end date and join both tests with -and: That one line hides three traps: times of day on the end date, dates that are really strings, and slow filtering on big logs. I’ll walk through each with … Read more
Every file object PowerShell hands you already knows its extension. Read the Extension property to get the file extension, and BaseName for the file name without the extension: For a path that’s only text, [System.IO.Path]::GetExtension() and GetFileNameWithoutExtension() do the same job without touching the disk. In this tutorial, I’ll show you how to get a … Read more
To import an Excel file in PowerShell, install the ImportExcel module and run Import-Excel. It reads the first worksheet into an array, one object per row, with the header row as property names: If Excel is installed and you’d rather skip the module, the Excel COM object gives you a two-dimensional array through UsedRange.Value2. I … Read more
Need to check if a PowerShell module is installed? Run Get-Module -ListAvailable -Name with the module’s name. It returns the module when it’s installed and nothing when it isn’t, so it drops straight into an if: Leave out -Name and the same command lists every installed module. Below I’ll cover both jobs, plus versions, gallery … Read more
To install software with PowerShell, use winget for any app in its catalog, msiexec for an .msi file, and Start-Process with the vendor’s silent switch for a setup .exe: In this tutorial, I’ll show you how to install software with PowerShell on Windows 11 and 10, check what’s already there, read installer exit codes, and … Read more