Format Azure PowerShell cmdlet output
By default each Azure PowerShell cmdlet formats output to be easy to read. PowerShell allows you to convert or format cmdlet output by piping to one of the following cmdlets:
| Formatting | Conversion |
|---|---|
| Format-Custom | ConvertTo-Csv |
| Format-List | ConvertTo-Html |
| Format-Table | ConvertTo-Json |
| Format-Wide | ConvertTo-Xml |
Formatting is used for display in the PowerShell console, and conversion is used for generating data to be consumed by other scripts or programs.
Table output format
By default, Azure PowerShell cmdlets output in the table format. This format doesn't display all information of the requested resource:
Get-AzVM
ResourceGroupName Name Location VmSize OsType NIC ProvisioningState Zone
----------------- ---- -------- ------ ------ --- ----------------- ----
QueryExample ExampleLinuxVM westus2 Basic_A0 Linux examplelinuxvm916 Succeeded
QueryExample RHELExample westus2 Standard_D2_v3 Linux rhelexample469 Succeeded
QueryExample WinExampleVM westus2 Standard_DS1_v2 Windows winexamplevm268 Succeeded
The amount of data displayed by Format-Table can be affected by the width of your PowerShell
session window. To restrict the output to specific properties and order them, property names can be
provided as arguments to Format-Table:
Get-AzVM -ResourceGroupName QueryExample |
Format-Table -Property Name, ResourceGroupName, Location
Name ResourceGroupName Location
---- ----------------- --------
ExampleLinuxVM QueryExample westus2
RHELExample QueryExample westus2
WinExampleVM QueryExample westus2
List output format
List output format produces two columns, property names followed by the value. For complex objects, the type of the object is displayed instead.
Get-AzVM | Format-List
The following output has some fields removed.
ResourceGroupName : QueryExample
Id : /subscriptions/.../resourceGroups/QueryExample/providers/Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines/ExampleLinuxVM
VmId : ...
Name : ExampleLinuxVM
Type : Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines
Location : westus2
...
HardwareProfile : Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.HardwareProfile
InstanceView :
NetworkProfile : Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.NetworkProfile
OSProfile : Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.OSProfile
...
StatusCode : OK
ResourceGroupName : QueryExample
Id : /subscriptions/.../resourceGroups/QueryExample/providers/Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines/RHELExample
VmId : ...
Name : RHELExample
Type : Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines
Location : westus2
...
Like Format-Table, property names can be provided to order and restrict the output:
Get-AzVM | Format-List -Property ResourceGroupName, Name, Location
ResourceGroupName : QueryExample
Name : ExampleLinuxVM
Location : westus2
ResourceGroupName : QueryExample
Name : RHELExample
Location : westus2
ResourceGroupName : QueryExample
Name : WinExampleVM
Location : westus2
Wide output format
Wide output format produces only one property name per query. Which property is displayed can be controlled by giving a property as an argument.
Get-AzVM | Format-Wide
ExampleLinuxVM RHELExample
WinExampleVM
Get-AzVM | Format-Wide -Property ResourceGroupName
QueryExample QueryExample
QueryExample
Custom output format
The Custom-Format output type is meant for formatting custom objects. Without any parameters, it
behaves like Format-List but displays the property names of custom classes.
Get-AzVM | Format-Custom
The following output has some fields removed.
ResourceGroupName : QueryExample
Id : /subscriptions/.../resourceGroups/QueryExample/providers/Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines/ExampleLinuxVM
VmId : ...
Name : ExampleLinuxVM
Type : Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines
Location : westus2
Tags : {}
HardwareProfile : {VmSize}
NetworkProfile : {NetworkInterfaces}
OSProfile : {ComputerName, AdminUsername, LinuxConfiguration, Secrets,
AllowExtensionOperations}
ProvisioningState : Succeeded
StorageProfile : {ImageReference, OsDisk, DataDisks}
...
Giving property names as arguments to Custom-Format displays the property/value pairs for custom
objects set as values:
Get-AzVM | Format-Custom -Property Name, ResourceGroupName, Location, OSProfile
The following output has some fields removed.
class PSVirtualMachineList
{
Name = ExampleLinuxVM
ResourceGroupName = QueryExample
Location = westus2
OSProfile =
class OSProfile
{
ComputerName = ExampleLinuxVM
AdminUsername = ...
AdminPassword =
CustomData =
WindowsConfiguration =
LinuxConfiguration =
class LinuxConfiguration
{
DisablePasswordAuthentication = False
Ssh =
ProvisionVMAgent = True
}
Secrets =
[
]
AllowExtensionOperations = True
}
}
...
class PSVirtualMachineList
{
Name = WinExampleVM
ResourceGroupName = QueryExample
Location = westus2
OSProfile =
class OSProfile
{
ComputerName = WinExampleVM
AdminUsername = ...
AdminPassword =
CustomData =
WindowsConfiguration =
class WindowsConfiguration
{
ProvisionVMAgent = True
EnableAutomaticUpdates = True
TimeZone =
AdditionalUnattendContent =
WinRM =
}
LinuxConfiguration =
Secrets =
[
]
AllowExtensionOperations = True
}
}
Conversion to other data formats
The ConvertTo-* family of cmdlets allows for converting the results of Azure PowerShell cmdlets to
machine-readable formats. To get only some properties from the Azure PowerShell results, pipe to the
Select-Object cmdlet before performing the conversion. The following examples demonstrate the
different kinds of output that each conversion produces.
Conversion to CSV
Get-AzVM | ConvertTo-CSV
#TYPE Microsoft.Azure.Commands.Compute.Models.PSVirtualMachineList
"ResourceGroupName","Id","VmId","Name","Type","Location","LicenseType","Tags","AvailabilitySetReference","DiagnosticsProfile","Extensions","HardwareProfile","InstanceView","NetworkProfile","OSProfile","Plan","ProvisioningState","StorageProfile","DisplayHint","Identity","Zones","FullyQualifiedDomainName","AdditionalCapabilities","RequestId","StatusCode"
"QUERYEXAMPLE","/subscriptions/.../resourceGroups/QUERYEXAMPLE/providers/Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines/ExampleLinuxVM","...","ExampleLinuxVM","Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines","westus2",,"System.Collections.Generic.Dictionary`2[System.String,System.String]",,,"System.Collections.Generic.List`1[Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.VirtualMachineExtension]","Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.HardwareProfile",,"Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.NetworkProfile","Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.OSProfile",,"Succeeded","Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.StorageProfile","Compact",,"System.Collections.Generic.List`1[System.String]",,,"...","OK"
"QUERYEXAMPLE","/subscriptions/.../resourceGroups/QUERYEXAMPLE/providers/Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines/RHELExample","...","RHELExample","Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines","westus2",,"System.Collections.Generic.Dictionary`2[System.String,System.String]",,,"System.Collections.Generic.List`1[Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.VirtualMachineExtension]","Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.HardwareProfile",,"Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.NetworkProfile","Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.OSProfile",,"Succeeded","Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.StorageProfile","Compact",,"System.Collections.Generic.List`1[System.String]",,,"...","OK"
"QUERYEXAMPLE","/subscriptions/.../resourceGroups/QUERYEXAMPLE/providers/Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines/WinExampleVM","...","WinExampleVM","Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines","westus2",,"System.Collections.Generic.Dictionary`2[System.String,System.String]",,,"System.Collections.Generic.List`1[Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.VirtualMachineExtension]","Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.HardwareProfile",,"Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.NetworkProfile","Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.OSProfile",,"Succeeded","Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.StorageProfile","Compact",,"System.Collections.Generic.List`1[System.String]",,,"...","OK"
Conversion to JSON
JSON output doesn't expand all properties by default. To change the depth of properties expanded,
use the Depth parameter. By default, the expansion depth is 2.
Get-AzVM | ConvertTo-JSON
The following output has some fields removed.
[
{
"ResourceGroupName": "QUERYEXAMPLE",
"Id": "/subscriptions/.../resourceGroups/QUERYEXAMPLE/providers/Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines/ExampleLinuxVM",
"VmId": "...",
"Name": "ExampleLinuxVM",
"Type": "Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines",
"Location": "westus2",
...
"OSProfile": {
"ComputerName": "ExampleLinuxVM",
"AdminUsername": "...",
"AdminPassword": null,
"CustomData": null,
"WindowsConfiguration": null,
"LinuxConfiguration": "Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.LinuxConfiguration",
"Secrets": "",
"AllowExtensionOperations": true
},
"Plan": null,
"ProvisioningState": "Succeeded",
"StorageProfile": {
"ImageReference": "Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.ImageReference",
"OsDisk": "Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.OSDisk",
"DataDisks": ""
},
"DisplayHint": 0,
"Identity": null,
"Zones": [
],
"FullyQualifiedDomainName": null,
"AdditionalCapabilities": null,
"RequestId": "...",
"StatusCode": 200
},
...
]
Conversion to XML
The ConvertTo-XML cmdlet converts the Azure PowerShell response object into a pure XML object,
which can be handled like any other XML object within PowerShell.
Get-AzVM | ConvertTo-XML
xml Objects
--- -------
version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" Objects
Conversion to HTML
Converting an object to HTML produces output that's rendered as an HTML table. Rendering of the HTML depends on your browser behavior for rendering tables which contain no width information. No custom class objects are expanded.
Get-AzVM | ConvertTo-HTML
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd">
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
<head>
<title>HTML TABLE</title>
</head><body>
<table>
<colgroup><col/><col/><col/><col/><col/><col/><col/><col/><col/><col/><col/><col/><col/><col/><col/><col/><col/><col/><col/><col/><col/><col/><col/><col/><col/></colgroup>
<tr><th>ResourceGroupName</th><th>Id</th><th>VmId</th><th>Name</th><th>Type</th><th>Location</th><th>LicenseType</th><th>Tags</th><th>AvailabilitySetReference</th><th>DiagnosticsProfile</th><th>Extensions</th><th>HardwareProfile</th><th>InstanceView</th><th>NetworkProfile</th><th>OSProfile</th><th>Plan</th><th>ProvisioningState</th><th>StorageProfile</th><th>DisplayHint</th><th>Identity</th><th>Zones</th><th>FullyQualifiedDomainName</th><th>AdditionalCapabilities</th><th>RequestId</th><th>StatusCode</th></tr>
<tr><td>QUERYEXAMPLE</td><td>/subscriptions/.../resourceGroups/QUERYEXAMPLE/providers/Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines/ExampleLinuxVM</td><td>...</td><td>ExampleLinuxVM</td><td>Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines</td><td>westus2</td><td></td><td>System.Collections.Generic.Dictionary`2[System.String,System.String]</td><td></td><td></td><td>System.Collections.Generic.List`1[Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.VirtualMachineExtension]</td><td>Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.HardwareProfile</td><td></td><td>Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.NetworkProfile</td><td>Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.OSProfile</td><td></td><td>Succeeded</td><td>Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.StorageProfile</td><td>Compact</td><td></td><td>System.Collections.Generic.List`1[System.String]</td><td></td><td></td><td>...</td><td>OK</td></tr>
<tr><td>QUERYEXAMPLE</td><td>/subscriptions/.../resourceGroups/QUERYEXAMPLE/providers/Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines/RHELExample</td><td>...</td><td>RHELExample</td><td>Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines</td><td>westus2</td><td></td><td>System.Collections.Generic.Dictionary`2[System.String,System.String]</td><td></td><td></td><td>System.Collections.Generic.List`1[Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.VirtualMachineExtension]</td><td>Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.HardwareProfile</td><td></td><td>Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.NetworkProfile</td><td>Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.OSProfile</td><td></td><td>Succeeded</td><td>Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.StorageProfile</td><td>Compact</td><td></td><td>System.Collections.Generic.List`1[System.String]</td><td></td><td></td><td>...</td><td>OK</td></tr>
<tr><td>QUERYEXAMPLE</td><td>/subscriptions/.../resourceGroups/QUERYEXAMPLE/providers/Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines/WinExampleVM</td><td>...</td><td>WinExampleVM</td><td>Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines</td><td>westus2</td><td></td><td>System.Collections.Generic.Dictionary`2[System.String,System.String]</td><td></td><td></td><td>System.Collections.Generic.List`1[Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.VirtualMachineExtension]</td><td>Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.HardwareProfile</td><td></td><td>Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.NetworkProfile</td><td>Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.OSProfile</td><td></td><td>Succeeded</td><td>Microsoft.Azure.Management.Compute.Models.StorageProfile</td><td>Compact</td><td></td><td>System.Collections.Generic.List`1[System.String]</td><td></td><td></td><td>...</td><td>OK</td></tr>
</table>
</body></html>