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Measure-Object

Published: February 29, 2012

Updated: August 15, 2012

Applies To: Windows PowerShell 2.0, Windows PowerShell 3.0

Measure-Object

Calculates the numeric properties of objects, and the characters, words, and lines in string objects, such as files of text.

Aliases

The following abbreviations are aliases for this cmdlet:

measure

Syntax

Parameter Set: GenericMeasure
Measure-Object [[-Property] <String[]> ] [-Average] [-InputObject <PSObject> ] [-Maximum] [-Minimum] [-Sum] [ <CommonParameters>]

Parameter Set: TextMeasure
Measure-Object [[-Property] <String[]> ] [-Character] [-IgnoreWhiteSpace] [-InputObject <PSObject> ] [-Line] [-Word] [ <CommonParameters>]

Detailed Description

The Measure-Object cmdlet calculates the property values of certain types of object. Measure-Object performs three types of measurements, depending on the parameters in the command.

The Measure-Object cmdlet performs calculations on the property values of objects. It can count objects and calculate the minimum, maximum, sum, and average of the numeric values. For text objects, it can count and calculate the number of lines, words, and characters.

Parameters

-Average

Displays the average value of the specified properties.

Aliases	none
Required?	false
Position?	named
Default Value	none
Accept Pipeline Input?	false
Accept Wildcard Characters?	false

-Character

Counts the number of characters in the input object.

Aliases	none
Required?	false
Position?	named
Default Value	none
Accept Pipeline Input?	false
Accept Wildcard Characters?	false

-IgnoreWhiteSpace

Ignores white space in word counts and character counts. By default, white space is not ignored.

Aliases	none
Required?	false
Position?	named
Default Value	False
Accept Pipeline Input?	false
Accept Wildcard Characters?	false

-InputObject<PSObject>

Specifies the objects to be measured. Enter a variable that contains the objects, or type a command or expression that gets the objects.

Aliases	none
Required?	false
Position?	named
Default Value	none
Accept Pipeline Input?	true (ByValue)
Accept Wildcard Characters?	false

-Line

Counts the number of lines in the input object.

Aliases	none
Required?	false
Position?	named
Default Value	False
Accept Pipeline Input?	false
Accept Wildcard Characters?	false

-Maximum

Displays the maximum value of the specified properties.

Aliases	none
Required?	false
Position?	named
Default Value	False
Accept Pipeline Input?	false
Accept Wildcard Characters?	false

-Minimum

Displays the minimum value of the specified properties.

Aliases	none
Required?	false
Position?	named
Default Value	False
Accept Pipeline Input?	false
Accept Wildcard Characters?	false

-Property<String[]>

Specifies one or more numeric properties to measure. The default is the Count (Length) property of the object.

Aliases	none
Required?	false
Position?	1
Default Value	Count
Accept Pipeline Input?	false
Accept Wildcard Characters?	false

-Sum

Displays the sum of the values of the specified properties.

Aliases	none
Required?	false
Position?	named
Default Value	False
Accept Pipeline Input?	false
Accept Wildcard Characters?	false

-Word

Counts the number of words in the input object.

Aliases	none
Required?	false
Position?	named
Default Value	False
Accept Pipeline Input?	false
Accept Wildcard Characters?	false

<CommonParameters>

This cmdlet supports the common parameters: -Verbose, -Debug, -ErrorAction, -ErrorVariable, -OutBuffer, and -OutVariable. For more information, see about_CommonParameters (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/p/?LinkID=113216).

Inputs

The input type is the type of the objects that you can pipe to the cmdlet.

System.Management.Automation.PSObject
You can pipe objects to Measure-Object.

Outputs

The output type is the type of the objects that the cmdlet emits.

Microsoft.PowerShell.Commands.GenericMeasureInfo, Microsoft.PowerShell.Commands.TextMeasureInfo, Microsoft.PowerShell.Commands.GenericObjectMeasureInfo
If you use the Word parameter, Measure-Object returns a TextMeasureInfo object. Otherwise, it returns a GenericMeasureInfo object.

Examples

-------------------------- EXAMPLE 1 --------------------------

This command counts the files and folders in the current directory.

PS C:\> get-childitem | measure-object

-------------------------- EXAMPLE 2 --------------------------

This command displays the minimum, maximum, and sum of the sizes of all files in the current directory, and the average size of a file in the directory.

PS C:\> get-childitem | measure-object -property length -minimum -maximum -average

-------------------------- EXAMPLE 3 --------------------------

This command displays the number of characters, words, and lines in the Text.txt file.

PS C:\> get-content C:\test.txt | measure-object -character -line -word

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

This command displays the minimum, maximum, and average sizes of the working sets of the processes on the computer.

PS C:\> get-process | measure-object -property workingset -minimum -maximum -average

-------------------------- EXAMPLE 5 --------------------------

This command calculates the average years of service of the employees of a company.

The ServiceYrs.csv file is a CSV file that contains the employee number and years of service of each employee. The first row in the table is a header row of "EmpNo, Years".

When you use Import-Csv to import the file, the result is a PSCustomObject with note properties of EmpNo and Years. You can use Measure-Object to calculate the values of these properties, just like any other property of an object.

PS C:\> import-csv d:\test\serviceyrs.csv | measure-object -property years -minimum -maximum -average

-------------------------- EXAMPLE 6 --------------------------

This example demonstrates the Measure-Object can measure Boolean values. In this case, it uses the PSIsContainer Boolean property to measure the incidence of folders (vs. files) in the current directory.

PS C:\> get-childitem | measure-object -property psiscontainer -max -sum -min -averageCount    : 126Average  : 0.0634920634920635Sum      : 8Maximum  : 1Minimum  : 0Property : PSIsContainer

Measure-Object

Measure-Object

Aliases

Syntax

Detailed Description

Parameters

-Average

-Character

-IgnoreWhiteSpace

-InputObject<PSObject>

-Line

-Maximum

-Minimum

-Property<String[]>

-Sum

-Word

<CommonParameters>

Inputs

Outputs

Examples

-------------------------- EXAMPLE 1 --------------------------

-------------------------- EXAMPLE 2 --------------------------

-------------------------- EXAMPLE 3 --------------------------

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

-------------------------- EXAMPLE 5 --------------------------

-------------------------- EXAMPLE 6 --------------------------

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