en-us/Getting_Started_With_Table_Views.walkthru.help.txt
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# Getting Started with EasyOuput
#.Video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aSY88XBTjrg # One of the simple ways you can use Write-FormatView and the rest of this module is to improve your # interaction with pieces of data that you normally use in PowerShell, but find difficult to read. # By using Write-FormatView, you can create a new look and feel for a type in PowerShell. # A great example is the WMI class Win32_VideoController. By default, no view is defined, so # when you run Get-WmiObject Win32_VideoController # You get every property that exists on the video controller class, which is, well, a lot. # One simple way to improve the experience is to make it a limited number of properties. # To do this, we need to find out the type name. You can see the type name at the top of # the output of Get-Member Get-WmiObject Win32_VideoController | Get-Member # Since everything is an object in PowerShell, we can pick out just the typename property from # the result of Get-Member, and use this in the rest of the examples. # This trick will work for any single type of object that comes out of any command. $typeName = Get-WmiObject Win32_VideoController | Get-Member | Select-Object -ExpandProperty TypeName -Unique # The first way we can try improving the look and feel is to display a fixed set of properties. # I'm interested in discovering the name, the ram, and the resolution. To write a piece of format XML # that can be used to display just these few properties, we just need to write this one line: Write-FormatView -TypeName $typeName -Property Name, AdapterRAM, VideoModeDescription # When this command is run, a bunch of text is outputted. This text can be used as part of a larger # format.ps1xml file you write, or you can join this and other views into a file with Out-FormatData. # If pipe Out-FormatData into Add-FormatData, you can dynamically add views to the output of anything # in PowerShell. Write-FormatView -TypeName $typeName -Property Name, AdapterRAM, VideoModeDescription | Out-FormatData | Add-FormatData # Now let's see how it looks Get-WmiObject Win32_VideoController # As we continue, we'll be able to make this much nicer and richer. # First, let's do the easy thing, and AutoSize the whole table. # This can be done to any table view with the -AutoSize switch Write-FormatView -TypeName $typeName -Property Name, AdapterRAM, VideoModeDescription -AutoSize | Out-FormatData | Add-FormatData # Let's see the difference Get-WmiObject Win32_VideoController # A better approach might be to use columns of a fixed width. Let's try this: Write-FormatView -TypeName $typeName -Property Name, AdapterRAM, VideoModeDescription -Width 30,15,40 | Out-FormatData | Add-FormatData # Let's see the difference Get-WmiObject Win32_VideoController # That's much easier to read, but we can still do better. I can't help but notice that # AdapterRAM sounds kind of less like what I want to think of the property, which is Memory. # Renaming the property is pretty easy a hashtable is used to describe # the items that will be renamed. The key is the new name, and the value is # the old name. The -Property parameter will contain the display names of # each of the properties, including the new name Write-FormatView -TypeName $typeName -Property Name, Memory, Mode -Width 30,15,40 -RenamedProperty @{ "Mode" = "VideoModeDescription" "Memory" = "AdapterRAM" } | Out-FormatData | Add-FormatData # Let's see the difference Get-WmiObject Win32_VideoController # One of the really nifty things about PowerShell is the fact that you can represent disk space # and memory in familiar terms, like mb, kb, gb. Since WMI returns this information to us in # the less readable (but more precise) form of bytes, let's see how we can use the -VirtualProperty # parameter of Write-FormatView to show the memory in megabytes # VirtualProperty is a hashtable like RenamedProperty. # The key in -VirtualProperty is the display name of the property, and # the value has to be a PowerShell script block { } # This Script Block is pretty simple, it just takes the current value ($_), divides it by megabytes, # and then adds the text 'mb' to the end. Write-FormatView -TypeName $typeName -Property Name, Memory, Mode -Width 30,15,40 -VirtualProperty @{ "Memory" = { "$($_.AdapterRAM / 1mb) mb" } } -RenamedProperty @{ "Mode" = "VideoModeDescription" }| Out-FormatData | Add-FormatData # Let's see the difference Get-WmiObject Win32_VideoController |