# Strings concatenate out of order

**URL:** <https://forums.powershell.org/t/strings-concatenate-out-of-order/16662>\
**Category:** PowerShell Help\
**Created:** [May 26, 2021, 8:17pm UTC](https://forums.powershell.org/t/strings-concatenate-out-of-order/16662 "2021-05-26T20:17:12Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 6\
**Page:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![techfringe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f475e1/32.png) [@techfringe](https://forums.powershell.org/u/techfringe)\
**Post date:** [May 26, 2021, 8:17pm UTC](https://forums.powershell.org/t/strings-concatenate-out-of-order/16662/1 "2021-05-26T20:17:12Z")

</div>

Part of a script has a line to concatenate strings. The strings are concatenating out of order.

Suggestions to fix greatly appreciated.

This…

```auto
$uId = "8"
$uName = "Corbin Dallas"
$uCompany = "The 5th Element"
write-host $uId; $uName; $uCompany

```

…works as expected and produces this (but of course it isn’t a new variable that can be used elsewhere)  
`8 Corbin Dallas The 5th Element`

However I need to add some additional elements to the strings and have been getting unexpected results. So, I’ve pared down what I’m doing to try and isolate the problem and that’s when I found the strings concatenating out of order.

this…

```auto
$cmd = $uId, """", $uName, """", $uCompany -join ""
Write-Host $cmd

```

produces this…  
`8 Corbin Dallas The 5th Element""`

and this…

```auto
$cmd2 = $uId + $uName + """" + $uCompany + """"
Write-Host $cmd2

```

produces the same thing…  
`8 Corbin Dallas The 5th Element""`

This is what things look like at the moment

 ![VirtualBox_Windows 10 Pro PDF signing testing WORKGROUP_26_05_2021_14_50_35](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/uploads/powershell/original/2X/f/f83e5fee3ebe05081c32fe4ccb1fd702c40c9551.png)

And here’s the complete code listing

```auto
Add-Type -AssemblyName System.Windows.Forms
Add-Type -AssemblyName System.Drawing

function call_browser {

    param ( [string]$uId, [string]$uName, [string]$uCompany )
    $folder = New-Object System.Windows.Forms.FolderBrowserDialog
    $folder.Description = "Select where to save file."
    $dest = $folder.ShowDialog()

    if ($dest -eq "OK" ) 
        { 
        write-host "This path was selected - " """" $($folder.SelectedPath) """" -Separator ""
        write-host $uId; $uName; $uCompany
        $cmd = $uId, """", $uName, """", $uCompany -join ""
        Write-Host $cmd
        $cmd2 = $uId + $uName + """" + $uCompany + """"
        Write-Host $cmd2
        } 
        else 
        { write-host "$dest selected" } 
}

$form = New-Object System.Windows.Forms.Form
$form.Text = 'My Form'
$form.Size = New-Object System.Drawing.Size(300,270)
$form.StartPosition = 'CenterScreen'

$okButton = New-Object System.Windows.Forms.Button
$okButton.Location = New-Object System.Drawing.Point(75,190)
$okButton.Size = New-Object System.Drawing.Size(75,23)
$okButton.Text = 'Select Path'
$okButton.Add_Click({call_browser( $textBoxID.Text, $textBoxName.Text, $textBoxCompany.Text )})
$form.AcceptButton = $okButton
$form.Controls.Add($okButton)

$cancelButton = New-Object System.Windows.Forms.Button
$cancelButton.Location = New-Object System.Drawing.Point(150,190)
$cancelButton.Size = New-Object System.Drawing.Size(75,23)
$cancelButton.Text = 'Quit'
$cancelButton.DialogResult = [System.Windows.Forms.DialogResult]::Cancel
$form.CancelButton = $cancelButton
$form.Controls.Add($cancelButton)

$labelID = New-Object System.Windows.Forms.Label
$labelID.Location = New-Object System.Drawing.Point(10,20)
$labelID.Size = New-Object System.Drawing.Size(280,20)
$labelID.Text = "ID"
$form.Controls.Add($labelID)

$textBoxID = New-Object System.Windows.Forms.TextBox
$textBoxID.Location = New-Object System.Drawing.Point(10,40)
$textBoxID.Size = New-Object System.Drawing.Size(260,20)
$form.Controls.Add($textBoxID)

$labelName = New-Object System.Windows.Forms.Label
$labelName.Location = New-Object System.Drawing.Point(10,70)
$labelName.Size = New-Object System.Drawing.Size(280,20)
$labelName.Text = 'Name:'
$form.Controls.Add($labelName)

$textBoxName = New-Object System.Windows.Forms.TextBox
$textBoxName.Location = New-Object System.Drawing.Point(10,90)
$textBoxName.Size = New-Object System.Drawing.Size(260,20)
$form.Controls.Add($textBoxName)

$labelCompany = New-Object System.Windows.Forms.Label
$labelCompany.Location = New-Object System.Drawing.Point(10,120)
$labelCompany.Size = New-Object System.Drawing.Size(280,20)
$labelCompany.Text = 'Company:'
$form.Controls.Add($labelCompany)

$textBoxCompany = New-Object System.Windows.Forms.TextBox
$textBoxCompany.Location = New-Object System.Drawing.Point(10,140)
$textBoxCompany.Size = New-Object System.Drawing.Size(260,20)
$form.Controls.Add($textBoxCompany)

$form.Add_Shown({$textBoxID.Select()})
$form.Topmost = $true

$form.ShowDialog()

```

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![matt-bloomfield](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/dec6dc/32.png) [@matt-bloomfield](https://forums.powershell.org/u/matt-bloomfield)\
**Post date:** [May 26, 2021, 8:51pm UTC](https://forums.powershell.org/t/strings-concatenate-out-of-order/16662/2 "2021-05-26T20:51:14Z")

</div>

Not entirely clear but I’m guessing you want to output this:

```auto
8 Corbin Dallas "The 5th Element"

```

Why not do this?

```auto
$uId = "8"
$uName = "Corbin Dallas"
$uCompany = "The 5th Element"
$newString = "$uID $uName ""$uCompany"""
Write-Output $newString
8 Corbin Dallas "The 5th Element"

```

If that’s not the expected output please let us know and we can amend it accordingly.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![techfringe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f475e1/32.png) [@techfringe](https://forums.powershell.org/u/techfringe)\
**Post date:** [May 27, 2021, 4:52am UTC](https://forums.powershell.org/t/strings-concatenate-out-of-order/16662/3 "2021-05-27T04:52:49Z")

</div>

Ultimately the string I want to encode (to be passed to cmd.exe to do the work) is the following with variables expanded.

`qrencode -m 8 -o $path\$uName.png "Id=$uId;Name=$uName;Company=$uCompany"`

Expanded and typed in the cmd window it would look like  
`C:\> qrencode -m 8 -o "C:\Corbin Dallas.png" "Id=8;Name=Corbin Dallas;Company=The 5th Element"`

All my attempts at producing the above gave such unexpected results that, for the post, I simplified it to the most basic problem, order of string concatenation.

Solve that and then on to the next problem. It works in bash but I need it in Windows.

Regarding what output is expected of `Write-Output $cmd` and `Write-Output $cmd2` that would be  
`8 " Corbin Dallas " The 5th Element`, exactly the order as written in the example.

**The problem** is the strings are not concatenating in the order they are written in the command.

For what it is worth, I tried your suggestion. Inserted the following after line 18 in the listing

```auto
$newString = "$uID $uName ""$uCompany"""
Write-Host $newString

```

The output still had the strings concatenated out of order. This is what was produced…  
`8 Corbin Dallas The 5th Element ""`

What I’m starting to see is the variables are expanded and concatenated then the text strings concatenated to the end regardless what order the elements appear in the expression concatenating them.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![matt-bloomfield](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/dec6dc/32.png) [@matt-bloomfield](https://forums.powershell.org/u/matt-bloomfield)\
**Post date:** [May 27, 2021, 5:08pm UTC](https://forums.powershell.org/t/strings-concatenate-out-of-order/16662/4 "2021-05-27T17:08:12Z")

</div>

Ok, so what’s happening here is that your function call  
`call_browser( $textBoxID.Text, $textBoxName.Text, $textBoxCompany.Text )`

is actually passing an array of Strings to the first parameter `$uId` of your function and the other two parameters aren’t populated.

You need to call the function with the following syntax:

```auto
$okButton.Add_Click({call_browser $textBoxID.Text $textBoxName.Text $textBoxCompany.Text })

```

Simple code to compare:

```auto
function testOne {

    param ( [string]$uId, [string]$uName, [string]$uCompany )

    Write-Host "`n"
    Write-Host "uId = $uId"
    Write-Host "uName = $uName"
    Write-Host "uCompany = $uCompany"
    Write-Host "$uId ""$uName"" $uCompany"
}

testOne('a','b','c')

function testTwo {

    param ( [string]$uId, [string]$uName, [string]$uCompany )

    Write-Host "`n"
    Write-Host "uId = $uId"
    Write-Host "uName = $uName"
    Write-Host "uCompany = $uCompany"
    Write-Host "$uId ""$uName"" $uCompany"
    
}

testTwo 'a' 'b' 'c'

```

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![techfringe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f475e1/32.png) [@techfringe](https://forums.powershell.org/u/techfringe)\
**Post date:** [May 28, 2021, 12:03pm UTC](https://forums.powershell.org/t/strings-concatenate-out-of-order/16662/5 "2021-05-28T12:03:23Z")

</div>

Thank you. THANK YOU.  
[matt-bloomfield](https://forums.powershell.org/u/matt-bloomfield)

Your instruction is the solution.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![dotnVo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4af34b/32.png) [@dotnVo](https://forums.powershell.org/u/dotnVo)\
**Post date:** [May 16, 2024, 8:24pm UTC](https://forums.powershell.org/t/strings-concatenate-out-of-order/16662/6 "2024-05-16T20:24:28Z")

</div>