PowerShell on Linux - Mini Project: Build & Apply

PowerShell on Linux: Basic File Info Script

📖 Scenario: You are using PowerShell on a Linux system to check details about files in a directory. This is useful when you want to quickly see file names and sizes without switching to other tools.

🎯 Goal: Create a PowerShell script that lists files in a directory and shows their names and sizes in bytes.

📋 What You'll Learn

Create a variable with a directory path

Create a variable to hold a file size limit

Use a loop to get files and filter by size

Print the file name and size for each filtered file

💡 Why This Matters

🌍 Real World

This script helps Linux users who use PowerShell to quickly find small files in a directory, useful for managing disk space or checking file details.

💼 Career

Knowing how to use PowerShell on Linux is valuable for system administrators and developers working in mixed environments or automating tasks across platforms.

1

Set the directory path

Create a variable called $directory and set it to the string "/usr/bin".

PowerShell

$directory = "/usr/bin"
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use = to assign the string "/usr/bin" to the variable $directory.

2

Set the file size limit

Create a variable called $sizeLimit and set it to the number 10000 (this means 10,000 bytes).

PowerShell

$directory = "/usr/bin"
$sizeLimit = 10000
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Assign the number 10000 to the variable $sizeLimit.

3

Get files and filter by size

Use Get-ChildItem with the path $directory to get files. Use a foreach loop with variable $file to check each file's Length. Inside the loop, use an if statement to select files where $file.Length -lt $sizeLimit. For these files, create a new object with properties Name and Length and add it to a list called $smallFiles.

PowerShell

$directory = "/usr/bin"
$sizeLimit = 10000
$smallFiles = @()
foreach ($file in Get-ChildItem -Path $directory) {
    # Your code here
}

Need a hint?

Start with an empty array $smallFiles = @(). Loop over files with foreach ($file in Get-ChildItem -Path $directory). Use if ($file.Length -lt $sizeLimit) to filter. Add matching files as custom objects to $smallFiles.

4

Display the filtered files

Use foreach with variable $item to loop over $smallFiles. Inside the loop, use Write-Output to print the file name and size in this format: "File: {Name}, Size: {Length} bytes".

PowerShell

$directory = "/usr/bin"
$sizeLimit = 10000
$smallFiles = @()
foreach ($file in Get-ChildItem -Path $directory) {
    if ($file.Length -lt $sizeLimit) {
        $smallFiles += [PSCustomObject]@{Name = $file.Name; Length = $file.Length}
    }
}
foreach ($item in $smallFiles) {
    # Your code here
}

Need a hint?

Loop over $smallFiles and print each file's name and size using Write-Output with string interpolation.