Color words in powershell script format-table output

Question

Is it possible to color only certain words (not complete lines) for a powershell output using format-table. For example, this script scans a folder recursively for a string and then output the result with format-table.

dir -r -i *.* | Select-String $args[0] |
format-table -Property @{label="Line #"; Expression={$_.LineNumber}; width=6},
Path, Line -wrap

It would be nice to be able to format the word we are searching for with a specific color, so that you can see exactly where it was found on the line.

mathk · Accepted Answer · 2014-04-22 11:58:48Z

16

You could pipe the table into Out-String, then write the string in parts using Write-Host with the -NoNewLine switch.

Something like this:

filter ColorWord {
    param(
        [string] $word,
        [string] $color
    )
    $line = $_
    $index = $line.IndexOf($word, [System.StringComparison]::InvariantCultureIgnoreCase)
    while($index -ge 0){
        Write-Host $line.Substring(0,$index) -NoNewline
        Write-Host $line.Substring($index, $word.Length) -NoNewline -ForegroundColor $color
        $used = $word.Length + $index
        $remain = $line.Length - $used
        $line = $line.Substring($used, $remain)
        $index = $line.IndexOf($word, [System.StringComparison]::InvariantCultureIgnoreCase)
    }
    Write-Host $line
}

Get-Process| Format-Table| Out-String| ColorWord -word 1 -color magenta

edited Apr 22, 2014 at 11:58

mathk

8,1416 gold badges47 silver badges76 bronze badges

answered Sep 9, 2011 at 13:46

Rynant

24.6k5 gold badges61 silver badges71 bronze badges

Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

2 Comments

EtienneT Over a year ago

Works great! Modified this line: $index = $line.IndexOf($word) to $index = $line.IndexOf($word, [System.StringComparison]::InvariantCultureIgnoreCase)

Rynant Over a year ago

Good point on the ignore case. I've updated the answer with the modification.

Community · Accepted Answer · 2020-06-20 09:12:55Z

6

I like Rynant's approach. Here is an alternate implementation, using -split instead of IndexOf:

filter ColorWord( [string]$word, [ConsoleColor]$color ) {
    $later = $false
    $_ -split [regex]::Escape( $word ) | foreach {
      if( $later ) { Write-Host "$word" -NoNewline -ForegroundColor $color }
      else { $later = $true }
      Write-Host $_ -NoNewline
    }
    Write-Host
}

Split includes empty strings if the line starts or ends with the given word, hence the extra "if not first" logic.

Edit: Following Rynant's comment, here's another implementation that supports both simple and regex patterns:

filter ColorPattern( [string]$Pattern, [ConsoleColor]$Color, [switch]$SimpleMatch ) {
  if( $SimpleMatch ) { $Pattern = [regex]::Escape( $Pattern ) }
  
  $split = $_ -split $Pattern
  $found = [regex]::Matches( $_, $Pattern, 'IgnoreCase' )
  for( $i = 0; $i -lt $split.Count; ++$i ) {
    Write-Host $split[$i] -NoNewline
    Write-Host $found[$i] -NoNewline -ForegroundColor $Color
  }
  
  Write-Host
}

The output from the following examples shows the difference:

PS> '\d00\d!' | ColorPattern '\d' 'Magenta' -Simple
\d00\d!

PS> '\d00\d!' | ColorPattern '\d' 'Magenta'
\d00\d!

edited Jun 20, 2020 at 9:12

CommunityBot

11 silver badge

answered Sep 10, 2011 at 0:47

Emperor XLII

13.5k11 gold badges69 silver badges78 bronze badges

2 Comments

Rynant Over a year ago

Just beware that you need to escape regex characters. E.g. 'Ke$ha - Tik Tok.mp3'| ColorWords 'ke\$ha' red. Alternatively, $_ -split [regex]::Escape($word) could be used in the filter. Unless you want to match with regex, which could be nice.

Emperor XLII Over a year ago

@Rynant Thanks for pointing that out! Updated with new version.

Remko · Accepted Answer · 2016-07-12 07:18:01Z

4

I love answer @Ryant gave. I have a modified version here that can be used for colouring multiple words in an output by passing in arrays or words and colours. The trick is that you have to split the input text into lines based on the newline separator.

filter ColorWord2 {
param(
    [string[]] $word,
    [string[]] $color
)
$all = $_
$lines = ($_ -split '\r\n')

$lines | % {
    $line = $_      
    $x = -1

    $word | % {
        $x++
        $item = $_      

        $index = $line.IndexOf($item, [System.StringComparison]::InvariantCultureIgnoreCase)                            
            while($index -ge 0){
                Write-Host $line.Substring(0,$index) -NoNewline                 
                Write-Host $line.Substring($index, $item.Length) -NoNewline -ForegroundColor $color[$x]
                $used =$item.Length + $index
                $remain = $line.Length - $used
                $line =$line.Substring($used, $remain)
                $index = $line.IndexOf($item, [System.StringComparison]::InvariantCultureIgnoreCase)
            }
        }

    Write-Host $line
} }

and would be executed as follows

Get-Service | Format-Table| Out-String| ColorWord2 -word 'Running','Stopped' -color 'Green','Red'

edited Jul 12, 2016 at 7:18

Remko

7,4003 gold badges35 silver badges53 bronze badges

answered Sep 22, 2015 at 15:27

stevethethread

2,5222 gold badges32 silver badges30 bronze badges

2 Comments

sch4v4 Over a year ago

I love this answer, it's exactly what I was looking for.

stevethethread Over a year ago

Cheers. I actually use a variation on this now. Rather than passing in two arrays, I just pass in a hashtable, with the colour being the key, and the value being an array of words that will have the colour applied to.

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

Color words in powershell script format-table output

3 Answers 3

2 Comments

2 Comments

2 Comments

Linked

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

3 Answers 3

2 Comments

2 Comments

2 Comments

Linked

Related