PowerShell ISE and VS code provide different output with the same code for object selection

Question

Running the following command line in both PowerShell ISE and VS Code on my system:

Get-ChildItem "$($env:systemdrive)\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\10\bin\" -Directory | Where { $_ -match "10." }

It gives out different output. On VS Code, the output will be like:

    Directory: C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\10\bin

Mode                 LastWriteTime         Length Name
----                 -------------         ------ ----
d----           1/27/2023 12:50 PM                10.0.14393.0
d----           1/27/2023 12:50 PM                10.0.15063.0
d----           1/27/2023 12:50 PM                10.0.16299.0
d----           1/27/2023 12:50 PM                10.0.17134.0
d----           10/7/2021  4:57 PM                10.0.18362.0
d----           10/7/2021  4:54 PM                10.0.19041.0
d----           1/11/2022  5:14 PM                10.0.20348.0
d----           1/27/2023 12:50 PM                10.0.22621.0
d----           1/27/2023 12:50 PM                arm
d----           1/27/2023 12:50 PM                arm64
d----           1/27/2023 12:50 PM                x64
d----           1/27/2023 12:50 PM                x86

Yet in the ISE, the output will be like:

    Directory: C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\10\bin


Mode                LastWriteTime         Length Name                                                                                      
----                -------------         ------ ----                                                                                      
d-----        1/27/2023  12:50 PM                10.0.14393.0                                                                              
d-----        1/27/2023  12:50 PM                10.0.15063.0                                                                              
d-----        1/27/2023  12:50 PM                10.0.16299.0                                                                              
d-----        1/27/2023  12:50 PM                10.0.17134.0                                                                              
d-----        10/7/2021   4:57 PM                10.0.18362.0                                                                              
d-----        10/7/2021   4:54 PM                10.0.19041.0                                                                              
d-----        1/11/2022   5:14 PM                10.0.20348.0                                                                              
d-----        1/27/2023  12:50 PM                10.0.22621.0

To me, this is a bug with PowerShell within VS code, or PowerShell 7, since I have the PSVersion 7.3.3 for VS code, and PSVersion 5.1.17763.3770 for ISE.

Anybody have any thought?

This is due to a change in behavior between Windows PowerShell 5.1 (the version used by ISE) in which "stringifying" a file system object outputs its name, whereas in PowerShell 7.x (the version underpinning VSCode) this results in the full path. Run `Get-ChildItem |% { "$_" }` in both to see this. Change your code to `Where-Object { $_.Name -match ... }` in any case — Mathias R. Jessen, Mar 23 '23 at 12:47
Reason is, with PowerShell 7, a `DirectoryInfo` instance when converted to string would resolve to its `FullName` property and your path happens to be `C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\10\bin` and `"10."` matches this pattern so every child item is listed. As opposed, `DirectoryInfo` instances when coerced to string will display their `Name` property in PowerShell 5.1. If you want accurate results in both versions you should: `| Where { $_.Name -match "10\." }` — Santiago Squarzon, Mar 23 '23 at 12:47
As an aside: The PowerShell ISE is [no longer actively developed](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powershell/scripting/components/ise/introducing-the-windows-powershell-ise#support) and [there are reasons not to use it](https://stackoverflow.com/a/57134096/45375) (bottom section), notably not being able to run PowerShell (Core) 6+. The actively developed, cross-platform editor that offers the best PowerShell development experience is [Visual Studio Code](https://code.visualstudio.com/) with its [PowerShell extension](https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=ms-vscode.PowerShell). — mklement0, Mar 23 '23 at 13:54

mklement0 · Answer 1 · 2023-03-23T14:17:58.873

Building on the helpful comments:

tl;dr

To be safe, always:

refer to the name of a directory- or file-information object output by Get-ChildItem explicitly with .Name
similarly, to get the full (absolute) path, use .FullName

The same applies analogously to the .Parent property of a directory-info object, which is itself a directory-info object.
By contrast, to get a file-info object's parent directory's name, use .Directory.Name, and .DirectoryName for the full path.

In your case:

Get-ChildItem "$($env:systemdrive)\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\10\bin" -Directory | 
  Where { $_.Name -match '^10\.' } # Note the use of .Name

Note that I've changed to 10. to ^10\.: Because the -match operator uses regular expressions, you must escape a literal . character that you want matched as such as \.
Additionally, it's better to ensure that literal 10. only match at the start of a directory name, hence the use use of ^.

That said, you can simplify and speed up your command with passing a wildcard pattern to Get-ChildItem's -Filter parameter:^[1]

Get-ChildItem -Filter 10.* "$($env:systemdrive)\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\10\bin\" -Directory

Background information

There is no bug, just a change in behavior between .NET Framework - which Windows PowerShell (the legacy edition with versions up to v5.1) is built on - and .NET (Core) 5+ - which PowerShell (Core) 7+ is built on - with respect to how System.IO.DirectoryInfo and System.IO.FileInfo instances, as output by Get-ChildItem, stringify (are coerced to strings).

In Windows PowerShell, they situationally stringify by their .Name property only, depending on the specifics of the Get-ChildItem command that emitted them; at other times they stringify by their .FullName property.
- See the bottom section of this answer for the conditions under which this name-only stringification happens.
In PowerShell (Core) they always stringify by their .FullName property, i.e. by their full (absolute) path.

As for what you tried:

$_ -match '10.' causes each input directory-info object ($_) to be stringified, due to -match being a string-only operator.
Therefore, in PowerShell (Core) $_ became a full path, and the full paths of all your input directories match regex 10., given that . can match _any character; e.g.:
```
# -> $true, because regex '10.' matches substring '10\' in the path
'C:\...\10\bin\arm' -match '10.'  
```

^{[1] Note that it is the file-system's wildcard language that -Filter supports, which differs from PowerShell's wildcards in that it has fewer features and legacy quirks - see this answer for the gory details.}

PowerShell ISE and VS code provide different output with the same code for object selection

1 Answers1

Background information