Hello,
How do I format into a table such a structure where columns in table will be Hashtable’s indexes
Code
$array = @();
$hashtable = @{Col1="1"; Col2="2"};
$array += $hashtable;
$array += $hashtable;
$array | ft
Output
Name Value ---- ----- Col2 2 Col1 1 Col2 2 Col1 1
Desired Output
Col1 Col2 1 2 1 2
You need to turn your hashtables into objects with Col1 and Col2 as properties. As it turns out, that’s incredibly easy:
# PowerShell 3.0 and later:
$array | ForEach-Object { [pscustomobject] $_ } | Format-Table
# PowerShell 2.0-compatible:
$array | ForEach-Object { New-Object -TypeName psobject -Property $_ } | Format-Table
This did not work. I’m V4
$array = @();
$hashtable = @{Col1="1"; Col2="2"};
$array += $hashtable;
$array += $hashtable;
$array | ForEach-Object { [pscustomobject] $_ } | Format-Table
output
Name Value ---- ----- Col2 2 Col1 1 Col2 2 Col1 1
Don’t know what to tell you. I ran the code before I posted, and it works fine for me.
How is this possible? This works for you?
I’m not seeing an image in your last post, but here’s what works for me. I’m running the latest preview of PowerShell 5.0, but as far as I know, nothing’s changed with the way this works since v3. (I don’t have any older systems online at the moment to test, though).
Here is the image
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B8pAWfQm4KqYcVExbGdRc0dHSmM/view?usp=sharing
Not working in PS 4.0
Well, do it the other way, then. 
Yes, v2 way works but I do have v4 though
PS C:\WINDOWS\system32> $PSVersionTable
Name Value
PSVersion 4.0
WSManStackVersion 3.0
SerializationVersion 1.1.0.1
CLRVersion 4.0.30319.34014
BuildVersion 6.3.9600.17090
PSCompatibleVersions {1.0, 2.0, 3.0, 4.0}
PSRemotingProtocolVersion 2.2
I’m seeing the same thing, so it’s not just your PowerShell misbehaving.
PS C:\Users\Martin> $array = @();
$hashtable = @{Col1="1"; Col2="2"};
$array += $hashtable;
$array += $hashtable;
$array | ForEach-Object { [pscustomobject] $_ } | Format-Table
Name Value
---- -----
Col2 2
Col1 1
Col2 2
Col1 1
PS C:\Users\Martin> $array = @();
$hashtable = @{Col1="1"; Col2="2"};
$array += $hashtable;
$array += $hashtable;
$array | ForEach-Object { New-Object psobject -Property $_ } | Format-Table
Col2 Col1
---- ----
2 1
2 1
PS C:\Users\Martin> $Host
Name : Windows PowerShell ISE Host
Version : 4.0
InstanceId : 95a1a0f8-a342-44e6-a47e-5a2cdc5ae206
UI : System.Management.Automation.Internal.Host.InternalHostUserInterface
CurrentCulture : en-US
CurrentUICulture : en-US
PrivateData : Microsoft.PowerShell.Host.ISE.ISEOptions
IsRunspacePushed : False
Runspace : System.Management.Automation.Runspaces.LocalRunspace
But with that said, I never liked the typecasting approach, and New-Object is faster anyway.
Fiddling around with it, I see that I can typecast the $hashtable variable, but I can’t typecast the pipeline object taken from an array of hashtables. Interesting.
PS C:\Users\Martin> [pscustomobject]$array[0]
Col2 Col1
---- ----
2 1
PS C:\Users\Martin> $array | foreach { [pscustomobject]$_ }
Name Value
---- -----
Col2 2
Col1 1
Col2 2
Col1 1
PS C:\Users\Martin> $array | foreach { $_.GetType() }
IsPublic IsSerial Name BaseType
-------- -------- ---- --------
True True Hashtable System.Object
True True Hashtable System.Object
PS C:\Users\Martin> $array[0].GetType()
IsPublic IsSerial Name BaseType
-------- -------- ---- --------
True True Hashtable System.Object
Actually typecasting is faster. Damn.
It appears to be a bug when piping into the ForEach-Object cmdlet. I can’t seem to reproduce it using any other looping method.
PS C:\Users\Martin> foreach($item in $array) { [pscustomobject]$item }
Col2 Col1
---- ----
2 1
2 1
PS C:\Users\Martin> $array.ForEach({ [pscustomobject]$_ })
Col2 Col1
---- ----
2 1
2 1
Even passing a single item into ForEach-Object fails
PS C:\Users\Martin> $array[0] | ForEach-Object { [pscustomobject]$_ }
Name Value
---- -----
Col2 2
Col1 1