Manipulating Data Within Powershell Functions

Question 1

Name the types of variables.

Answer 1

1. Loosely typed - when a value is assigned to an undefined type of variable
   $variable
2. Strongly typed - type is assigned to variable
   Variable is an integer, or string

Question 2

What is a variable?

Answer 2

A unit of memory in which values are stored

Question 3

What are the different variable types?

Answer 3

1. User-created variables
2. Automatic variables
3. Preference variables

Question 4

What is a user created variables?

Answer 4

Created and maintained by the user. Variables created within the PS command line exits only while the PS window is open.

Question 5

What are automatic variables?

Answer 5

Store the state of PS. PS created these variables and changes their values as required to maintain their accuracy.

Question 6

What are preference variables?

Answer 6

Store users preference for PS. These variables are created by PS and populated with default values that may be changed.

Question 7

Create a typed variable for the number 10

Answer 7

[Int]$variable1 = 10

Question 8

Created a typed variable for the date January 1, 2023

Answer 8

[DateTime]$variable1 = “January 1, 2023”

Question 9

What are six common variable types?

Answer 9

Boolean
DateTime
Powershell object
Script block
String
Array

Question 10

What is casting data values?

Answer 10

Converting one object type to another

Not all objects can be cast

Question 11

When a value is cast to a particular data type, it is a ……

Answer 11

One time change

Question 12

When a variable is cast to to a particular data type it stays until…..

Answer 12

It is updates

Question 13

Cast $variable1 = 1 as an integer using the AS operator

Answer 13

$Variable1 -as [int]

Question 14

What is the F operator?

Answer 14

Used to format the values or string into something else

You can begin the statement with the format you want

Question 15

Format ‘$variable1 = 123.4567890’ to display only three decimal places

Answer 15

“{0:n3}” -f $variable

Question 16

Format ‘$variable1 = 3106359509’ with dashes to look like a phone number

Answer 16

“{0:###-###-####}” -f $variable1

Question 17

How do you determine what type of variable ‘number1’ is?

Answer 17

$number1.GetType().Name

Question 18

What does the dash replace operator do?
-replace

Answer 18

It takes the Input string - replace operator - matching pattern - replacement string

Question 19

What is the input value, replace operator, matching string, and replacement value for the following?

$variable1 = “The class instructor asked for a volunteer for a demonstration”

Answer 19

The input string is ‘$variable1’

The replace operator is ‘-replace’

The matching string is ‘instructor’

The replace string is ‘teacher’

Question 20

What is the regex to switch around the Jones Tom to Tom Jones?

Answer 20

([a-z]+)\s([a-z]+) “,’$2, $1’

Question 21

What is the -Split operator?

Answer 21

Splits one or more strings into substrings. White space is the delimiter.

Question 22

What is the order of the -Split operator syntax?

Answer 22

Delimiter - number of substrings - conditions the delimiter matches

Question 23

You have variable ‘$quarter1 = “Jan Feb Mar”.

If you split how is the output displayed?

Answer 23

Jan
Feb
Mar

Question 24

You have variable ‘$quarter1 = “Jan,Feb,Mar”.

If you split how is the output displayed?

Answer 24

Jan
Feb
Mar

Question 25

You have variable ‘$quarter1 = “Jan Feb Mar”.

If you split how is the output displayed?

Question 26

What does the .Split() Function work?

Answer 26

Splits input into multiple substrings based on the delimiters

Uses white space characters like space, tabs, and line breaks as default delimiter

Available for all STRING type variables and values

Question 27

Separate based on the delimiter using the Split function:

$variable = “Jan,Feb,Mar,Apr,May,Jun”

Answer 27

$variable.Split(‘ , ‘’)

Question 28

What is padding string values?

Answer 28

Add padding to the LEFT or RIGHT of a string value according the desired length.

Question 29

How would you pad right to add ‘A’ to the end of $variable = “Demonstration”

Answer 29

$variable.PadRight(14, ‘A’)

Question 30

How do you create a variable array with comma separated text values for Jan Feb Mar Apr May and June?

Answer 30

$variable = @(‘Jan’,’Feb’,’Mar’,’Apr’,’May’,’Jun’)

Question 31

What are the different ways you can access the following variable array?

$variable = @(‘Jan’,’Feb’,’Mar’,’Apr’,’May’,’Jun’)

Answer 31

$variable
$variable[0]
$variable[0,1,4]
$variable[0..4]

Question 32

How do you access array items using Pipeline with ForEach-Object Loop?

$variable = @(‘Jan’,’Feb’,’Mar’,’Apr’,’May’,’Jun’)

Answer 32

$variable | ForEach-Object {“The month is: $PSItem”}

Question 33

What is $PSItem?

Answer 33

Standard PS variable for the output for an ForEach object loop

Question 34

How do you access array items using the ForEach Method?

$variable = @(‘Jan’,’Feb’,’Mar’,’Apr’,’May’,’Jun’)

Answer 34

$variable.ForEach({“The month is: $PSItem”})

Question 35

What are hash tables?

Answer 35

Like an array, except you can store every value (object) using a key. Has tables only contain values, not properties. They are a key value store.

Also known as a dictionary or associative array.

Question 36

How to create a hash table?

Answer 36

$variable = @{ }

Question 37

Create a country population hashtable.

China = 10
India = 8
US = 6
UK = 2

Answer 37

$variable = @{
China = 10;
India = 8;
US = 6;
UK = 2
}

Question 38

How do output the keys in a hashtable?

Answer 38

$variable.keys

Question 39

How do you output the values in a hashtable?

Answer 39

$variable.values

Question 40

How do you access array items using a ForEach Loop?

$variable = @(‘Jan’,’Feb’,’Mar’,’Apr’,’May’,’Jun’)

Answer 40

ForEach ($item in $variable) {“The month is: $item”}

Question 41

How do you access array items using a For Loop?

$variable = @(‘Jan’,’Feb’,’Mar’,’Apr’,’May’,’Jun’)

Answer 41

For ($item = 0; $item -lt $variable.count; $item++). {
“The month is: {0}” -f $variable[$item];
Write-Host “Current Position: $item”
}

Question 42

What are PSCustomObject’s?

Answer 42

A simple way to create structured data comprised of both properties and values.

Question 43

How do you create an empty PSCustomObject?

Answer 43

$variable = [PSCustomObject]@{ }

$variable = New-Object -TypeName PSObject

Question 44

Common commands for loading and iterating XML and JSON data?

Answer 44

ConvertTo-XML

ConvertFrom-Json

ConvertTo-Json

Question 45

What is the simplest approach to use when loading XML?

Answer 45

The SELECT-XML command