2 Digit Country Codes generation in Powershell

Question

Hi,

I am requiring to output a 2 digit country code based on a country.

Array would be something like

$array += [[[[Austria],[AU]],[[Brazil],[BZ]]]]

So i would expect it to be something like

if ($array -match 'Brazil'){ it returns BZ}

What would be the best way of going about that?

Thanks for help

Answer 1

Don't use an array, use a hash instead:

$hash = @{Austria='AU'; Brazil='BZ'}
$CountryNames = 'Austria','Brazil','Canada'
$CountryNames |
    ForEach-Object{
        $CC = $hash[$_]
        Write-Host "Country name '$_' has the code '$CC'"   # doesn't report an error, just an empty country code
    }
# -- or
$CountryNames |
    ForEach-Object{
        if($hash.ContainsKey($_)){
            $CC = $hash[$_]
            Write-Host "Country name '$_' has the code '$CC'"
        }
        Else{
            Write-Host "Country name '$_' is not in lookup table"
        }
    }

Answer 2

If you'd rather use what data are present in the Windows O/S instead of building/maintaining your own translation table, give this a try. The $hash variable at the end is what you want:

$AllCultures = [System.Globalization.CultureInfo]::GetCultures([System.Globalization.CultureTypes]::SpecificCultures) # !AllCultures

$AllCultures |
    ForEach-Object{
        $dn = $_.DisplayName.Split("(|)");
        $RegionInfo = New-Object System.Globalization.RegionInfo $PsItem.name;
        [pscustomobject]@{
                Name = $RegionInfo.Name;
                EnglishName = $RegionInfo.EnglishName;
                TwoLetterISORegionName = $RegionInfo.TwoLetterISORegionName;
                GeoId = $RegionInfo.GeoId;
                ISOCurrencySymbol = $RegionInfo.ISOCurrencySymbol;
                CurrencySymbol = $RegionInfo.CurrencySymbol;
                IsMetric = $RegionInfo.IsMetric;
                LCID = $PsItem.LCID;
                Lang = $dn[0].Trim();
                Country = $dn[1].Trim();
            }
    } |
        # get list of unique country names and ISO codes in Windows
        Select-Object -Unique -prop TwoLetterISORegionName,EnglishName | 
            Sort-Object TwoLetterISORegionName |
                ForEach-Object{
                    $hash[$_.EnglishName] = $_.TwoLetterISORegionName
                }

All the information in the PSCustomObject isn't necessary. It doesn't hurt to know it's there, though.

The code was shamelessly purloined (and slightly modified) from here: powershell-get-list-of-two-letter-country-iso-3166-code-alpha-2-currency-language-and-more