Support non-object arrays

[iRon7]

Especially in a case of a side-by-side joins (where the -on parameter is omitted), it would be handy to be able join an array of something that is not an object (meaning anything that doesn't have visual properties like strings and primitives) to an complex (PowerShell) object list, or to another array of non-objects.

[iRon7]

Implementation

(Version 3.4.0 and up)

If you join on or more scalar arrays, a scalar array will be return which can be easily used in a foreach loop:

$a = 'a1', 'a2', 'a3', 'a4'
$b = 'b1', 'b2', 'b3', 'b4'
$c = 'c1', 'c2', 'c3', 'c4'
$d = 'd1', 'd2', 'd3', 'd4'

Example 1: Default join of multiple scalar arrays

$a |Join $b |Join $c |Join $d |% { "$_" } 
# or: foreach ($row in ($a |Join $b |Join $c |Join $d)) { "$Row" }
# or: $a |Join $b |Join $c |Join $d |% { '{0} {1} {2} {3}' -f $_[0], $_[1], $_[2], $_[3] }  

a1 b1 c1 d1
a2 b2 c2 d2
a3 b3 c3 d3
a4 b4 c4 d4

Example 2: Naming items

$a |Join $b |Join $c |Join $d -Name a, b, c, d

a  b  c  d
-  -  -  -
a1 b1 c1 d1
a2 b2 c2 d2
a3 b3 c3 d3
a4 b4 c4 d4

Example 3: Joining a scalar array with an object array:

$Id = 'a1', 'a2', 'a3', 'a4'
$Department = ConvertFrom-Csv @'
"Name",        "Country"
"Engineering", "Germany",
"Marketing",   "England",
"Sales",       "France",
"Purchase",    "France"
'@

$Id |Join $Department

Value Name        Country
----- ----        -------
a1    Engineering Germany
a2    Marketing   England
a3    Sales       France
a4    Purchase    France

Note that the scalar column will be named Value by default when it joined with a PowerShell object, to change this use the -ValueName parameter, e.g.: $Id |Join $Department -ValueName Id

[iRon7]

Implemented in version 3.4.0