Reading and Resolving PowerShell Errors

Reading and Resolving PowerShell Errors - Part 7

This is part 7 of my series of the most common PowerShell errors that are made in my PowerShell classes. I will be posting one a day to help you understand why an error occurred and what the error’s meaning is.

Today’s error: The "Expression" key has a type, System.Int32, that is not valid

Here is our starting code:

Get-CimInstance -ClassName Win32_LogicalDisk |

Select-Object -Property @{

Name="FreeSpaceGB"

Expression = $_.FreeSpace/1GB

}

And here is the full error:

Select-Object : The "Expression" key has a type, System.Int32, that is not

valid; expected types are {System.String,

System.Management.Automation.ScriptBlock}.

At line:2 char:5

+ Select-Object -Property @{

+ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

+ CategoryInfo : InvalidArgument: (:) [Select-Object], NotSupport

edException

+ FullyQualifiedErrorId : DictionaryKeyIllegalValue1,Microsoft.PowerShell.

Commands.SelectObjectCommand

Resolution:

Use proper syntax when created a custom property.

This is a relatively easy fix, but the error message does not reflect this. Take a look at example #4 of the help file for Select-Object.

-------------------------- EXAMPLE 4 --------------------------

PS C:\>Get-process | Select-Object -Property ProcessName,@{Name="Start Day"; Expression = {$_.StartTime.DayOfWeek}}

ProcessName StartDay

---- --------

alg Wednesday

ati2evxx Wednesday

ati2evxx Thursday

...

Notice that the Expression has its own script block. In other words, our code is missing a set of {} for the expression. The expression can be multiple lines of code if needed to calculate your expression. Take a look at our code now.

Get-CimInstance -ClassName Win32_LogicalDisk |

Select-Object -Property @{

Name="FreeSpaceGB"

Expression = {$_.FreeSpace/1GB}

}

FreeSpaceGB

-----------

6.24723815917969

With the {} encapsulating the value of our expression, all is good.

Comments

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