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Preserving property order

Posted by: | December 30, 2016 Comments Off on Preserving property order |

This is a very common pattern:

 

$os = Get-CimInstance -ClassName Win32_OperatingSystem
$comp = Get-CimInstance -ClassName Win32_ComputerSystem

$props = @{
OS = $os.Caption
InstallDate = $os.InstallDate
LastBoot = $os.LastBootUpTime
Make = $comp.Manufacturer
Model = $comp.Model
}

New-Object -TypeName PSObject -Property $props

 

Get some data – in this case a couple of WMI classes and create an output object.

Unfortunately, the output looks like this

 

Make        : Microsoft Corporation
Model       : Surface Pro 2
LastBoot    : 30/12/2016 09:41:52
OS          : Microsoft Windows 10 Pro Insider Preview
InstallDate : 08/12/2016 13:20:04

 

The property order is NOT preserved because you’re working with a hash table. If you absolutely have to preserve the property order use an ordered hash table

 

$os = Get-CimInstance -ClassName Win32_OperatingSystem
$comp = Get-CimInstance -ClassName Win32_ComputerSystem

$props = [ordered]@{
OS = $os.Caption
InstallDate = $os.InstallDate
LastBoot = $os.LastBootUpTime
Make = $comp.Manufacturer
Model = $comp.Model
}

New-Object -TypeName PSObject -Property $props

 

All you do is add [ordered] in front of the hashtable definition and your output becomes

 

OS          : Microsoft Windows 10 Pro Insider Preview
InstallDate : 08/12/2016 13:20:04
LastBoot    : 30/12/2016 09:41:52
Make        : Microsoft Corporation
Model       : Surface Pro 2

 

exactly what you defined

under: PowerShell Basics

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