How can i get the sum of a line from a .txt file in powershell?

Question

So, I have a textfile "numbers.txt" like this:

2 3 4 5
5 6
6 7 7
6 88 9 67 4
65 76 979 8
6 88 5 4 23

My question is, how can i get the sum of each line? What i tried to do:

$data=Get-Content -Delimiter " " numbers.txt
$data | % {
 $sum=0
 foreach($num in $_) {
 $sum+=$num
 }
 Write-Host $sum
 }

But it gives back weird numbers. I dont know how to separate the different numbers in each line and get the sum of them.

As an aside: [`Write-Host` is typically the wrong tool to use](http://www.jsnover.com/blog/2013/12/07/write-host-considered-harmful/), unless the intent is to write _to the display only_, bypassing the success output stream and with it the ability to send output to other commands, capture it in a variable, redirect it to a file. To output a value, use it _by itself_; e.g., just `$sum` instead of `Write-Host $sum` (or use `Write-Output $value`, though that is rarely needed). See also: the bottom section of https://stackoverflow.com/a/50416448/45375 — mklement0, Dec 08 '19 at 15:07

mklement0 · Accepted Answer · 2019-12-08T14:55:19.877

Here's a fast and concise PSv4+ solution that utilizes LINQ:

(Get-Content numbers.txt).ForEach({ 
  [Linq.Enumerable]::Sum([int[]] ($_ -split ' ')) 
})

(Get-Content numbers.txt) returns the input file's lines as an array of strings.
.ForEach({ ... }) executes a script block ({ ...}) for each input line.
- [Linq.Enumerable]::Sum(...) sums the elements of an array (enumerable) of numbers.
- $_ -split ' ' splits the input line at hand ($_) into (string) tokens by spaces, and converts the result to an array of integers ([int[]]).

Here's a - slower - solution closer to what you attempted (works in PSv3- too):

Get-Content numbers.txt | ForEach-Object {  # Process each line.
  $sum = 0 # initialize the sum (implicitly of type [int])
  foreach ($num in $_ -split ' ') { # Process all tokens on the line.
    # Note: Because $sum is [int]-typed, adding the *string* token at 
    #       hand implicitly converts it to [int].
    $sum += $num  
  }
  $sum # Output the sum - do NOT use Write-Host to output DATA
}

Both solutions yield the following:

14     # 2 + 3 + 4 + 5
11     # 5 + 6
20     # ...
174
1128
126

As for what you tried:

Get-Content -Delimiter " " numbers.txt

This splits your entire file into a single array of number strings, ignoring line boundaries.

Instead, you must use Get-Content as-is in order to process the file line by line, and then split each line into space-separated tokens to sum up.

js2010 · Answer 2 · 2019-12-08T14:28:07.063

0

Turn it into a single array of numbers:

-split (get-content numbers.txt) | measure -sum | % sum

1473

Oops, sum each line:

get-content numbers.txt | foreach { -split $_ | measure -sum } | foreach sum

14
11
20
174
1128
126

edited Dec 08 '19 at 14:28

answered Dec 08 '19 at 14:21

js2010

23,033
6
64
66

How can i get the sum of a line from a .txt file in powershell?

2 Answers2