Equivalent of Bash's ${myvar:-default} in Powershell?

Question

In Bash, I can do something like:

${VAR1:-default}

...which means if VAR1 doesn't exist, return "default".

There are lots of these types of operators:

There seem to be numerous examples using Get-Variable but nothing particularly succinct. Is there an equivalent in Powershell that I'm missing?

AFAIK PowerShell doesn't support this kind of parameter expansion. What are you trying to achieve? Do you need this for function parameters or for variables in general? — Ansgar Wiechers, Jun 28 '17 at 09:31
FWIW If that's inside a string you use as a template, you can make your own template processing function that behaves just like Bash. — wOxxOm, Jun 28 '17 at 09:32

score 1 · Answer 1 · answered Jun 28 '17 at 11:25

If you need defaults when processing the arguments to your script or function, then yes you can supply them:

param (
    [string]$price = 100, 
    [string]$ComputerName = $env:computername,    
    [string]$username = $(throw "-username is required."),
    [string]$password = $( Read-Host -asSecureString "Input password" )
    [switch]$SaveData = $false
)

but if you mean defaults when substituting an existing variable into an expression then no, you have to write an expression that gives you the desired value.

Equivalent of Bash's ${myvar:-default} in Powershell?

1 Answers1