{"id":720,"date":"2020-04-22T11:05:33","date_gmt":"2020-04-22T16:05:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/itblog.ldlnet.net\/?p=720"},"modified":"2020-04-22T11:11:40","modified_gmt":"2020-04-22T16:11:40","slug":"powershell-how-to-create-a-custom-view-for-your-ps-output-objects","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/itblog.ldlnet.net\/index.php\/2020\/04\/22\/powershell-how-to-create-a-custom-view-for-your-ps-output-objects\/","title":{"rendered":"PowerShell – How to create a custom view for your PS Output Objects"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

I have been doing some training on PowerShell Scripting this week and am going to be posting a number of articles on what I have been training on. This article deal with formatting your data output from your custom script or function to be viewed the way that you want it.
Have you ever run a cmdlet where the column width is not wide enough and your data get’s truncated? Well, here is a method that you can use to make the default output of your function or script display how you want it to.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The best way to do this is by using an existing xml formatting file as a template. Run the following PowerShell commands to access those templates:<\/p>\n\n\n

Set-Location $PSHOME\nGet-ChildItem | Where-Object -FilterScript {$_.name -match \u201c.xml$\u201d}\n<\/pre>\n\n\n\n
Note: your custom view xml file will need to have the \u201c.ps1xml\u201d extension, which indicates that it is a \u201cWindows Powershell XML Document\u201d.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n
Now to creating the custom template. Let’s say you have the following function.<\/p>\n\n\n
function new-hmrcobject \n\n{\n$MyHashtable = @{\u2018column1\u2019=\u201daaa\u201d;\n\u2018column2\u2019=\u201dbbb\u201d;\n\u2018column3\u2019=\u201dccc\u201d\n}\n\n$obj = New-Object -TypeName psobject -property $MyHashtable\n\n# Here we attach our object to a custom view called \u201chrmctoolcustomformat\u201d\n$obj.PSObject.TypeNames.Insert(0,\u2019hrmctoolcustomformat\u2019) \n\n$obj\n}\n<\/pre>\n\n\n\n
Now, create a custom view using the following file as a template:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
C:\\WINDOWS\\system32\\WindowsPowerShell\\v1.0\\DotNetTypes.format.ps1xml<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n
Note: You can get a list of the format type template files that already comes with PS running the following command:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n
Get-ChildItem | Where-Object -FilterScript {$_.name -match \u201c.format.ps1xml\u201d}\n<\/pre>\n\n\n\n
Sample Output:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n
Mode LastWriteTime Length Name
\u2014- \u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014- \u2014\u2014 \u2014-
-a\u2014 10\/06\/2009 21:41 27338 Certificate.format.ps1xml
-a\u2014 10\/06\/2009 21:41 27106 Diagnostics.Format.ps1xml
-a\u2014 23\/07\/2012 19:12 144442 DotNetTypes.format.ps1xml
-a\u2014 23\/07\/2012 19:12 14502 Event.Format.ps1xml
-a\u2014 23\/07\/2012 19:12 21293 FileSystem.format.ps1xml
-a\u2014 23\/07\/2012 19:12 287938 Help.format.ps1xml
-a\u2014 23\/07\/2012 19:12 97880 HelpV3.format.ps1xml
-a\u2014 23\/07\/2012 19:12 101824 PowerShellCore.format.ps1xml
-a\u2014 10\/06\/2009 21:41 18612 PowerShellTrace.format.ps1xml
-a\u2014 23\/07\/2012 19:12 13659 Registry.format.ps1xml
-a\u2014 23\/07\/2012 19:12 17731 WSMan.Format.ps1xml<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Remember: A custom view must always end with \u201c.format.ps1xml\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n
We will use DotNetTypes.format.ps1xml <\/strong>as a template. Using this file, create a file called \u201chrmctools.formatps1xml\u201d. That file will contain the following information modified from the template:<\/p>\n\n\n
\n \n \n     \n\t\t \n            hrmctoolcustomformat<\/Name>\n\t\t\t# This must match with the “insert” command above so that object is linked to this format \n             \n                hrmctoolcustomformat<\/TypeName>\n\t\t\t\t# This must match with the “insert” command above so that object is linked to this format \n            <\/ViewSelectedBy> \n              \n                 \n                     \n