current community

your communities

more stack exchange communities

Stack Exchange
tour help
stack overflow careers
Take the 2-minute tour ×
Stack Overflow is a question and answer site for professional and enthusiast programmers. It's 100% free.
up vote 8 down vote favorite
1

I want to create an array of arrays in powershell.

$x = @(
    @(1,2,3),
    @(4,5,6)
)

Works fine. However, sometimes I have only one array in the array list. In that situation, powershell ignores one of the lists:

$x = @(
    @(1,2,3)
)

$x[0][0] # Should return 1
Unable to index into an object of type System.Int32.
At line:1 char:7
+ $a[0][ <<<< 0]
    + CategoryInfo          : InvalidOperation: (0:Int32) [], RuntimeException
    + FullyQualifiedErrorId : CannotIndex

How do I create an array of arrays, guaranteed it's remain as a two-dimension array even if the array has only one array item in it?

share|improve this question

1 Answer 1

up vote 14 down vote accepted

Adding a comma force to create an array:

$x = @(
    ,@(1,2,3)
)

Simple way:

$x = ,(1,2,3)
share|improve this answer
    
The magic comma strikes again! Why does powershell won't create array without comma? –  jumbo Jun 21 '12 at 12:54
7  
A good article on the magic : blogs.msdn.com/b/powershell/archive/2007/01/23/…. The comma operator is the array construction operator in PowerShell –  CB. Jun 21 '12 at 12:56
    
Thanks for that article! I wanted to read such article long time ago. Now I get it finally ;) –  jumbo Jun 21 '12 at 13:29
    
Of course, then for consistency of syntax, you would hope that this @( ,@(1,2,3) ,@(4,5,6) ) would work... but it doesn't give you what you expect. Sigh. –  David I. McIntosh Apr 14 '14 at 14:50

Your Answer

 
discard

By posting your answer, you agree to the privacy policy and terms of service.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.