This is a script I wrote to give me the time until next year...

[console]::title = "Next Year Count Down"

$NextYearDate = get-date "1/1/2010"
$NextYearDate - ([datetime]::now)

while (1)
{
cls
Write-Host "Time until Next Year: "
write-host ""
$NextYearDate - ([datetime]::now) | select days, hours, minutes, seconds |
ft -autosize
$NextYearDate - ([datetime]::now) | select totaldays, totalhours,
totalminutes, totalseconds| ft -autosize
sleep 1
}



It fails when run from a script, but succeeds when cut and pasted into the
console. Ideas?

The problem is an outstream quirk that starts in this line:

$NextYearDate - ([datetime]::now)

When the output -in the form of a Format-List- is merged with Format-Table's output, the script breaks.
To fix it pipe the output from that lne to Out-Default.

# pipe the output to Out-Default
$NextYearDate - ([datetime]::now) | Out-Default

# or suppress it, since it's wiped by the cls statement anyway
$NextYearDate - ([datetime]::now) | Out-Null

--
Kiron

That's weird that it works when pasted to the powershell console, but not in
the script, is it a bug? Anyway, the reason I added that, is because a blank
line gets displayed before the time spans the first time the script runs
(another bug?)
"Kiron" <Kiron@xxxxxx> wrote in message
news658F33C-F949-49BB-8D49-43C9FF8B4681@xxxxxx

> The problem is an outstream quirk that starts in this line:
>
> $NextYearDate - ([datetime]::now)
>
> When the output -in the form of a Format-List- is merged with
> Format-Table's output, the script breaks.
> To fix it pipe the output from that lne to Out-Default.
>
> # pipe the output to Out-Default
> $NextYearDate - ([datetime]::now) | Out-Default
>
> # or suppress it, since it's wiped by the cls statement anyway
> $NextYearDate - ([datetime]::now) | Out-Null
>
> --
> Kiron

The reason the script works in the console is because each statement is treated as a separate pipeline and their output, if any, are separated.
If you execute the scipt as a oneliner in the console you will see the same bug.
Format-Table prepends the blank line, you can omit it, and all other blank lines, by piping Format-Table's output to Out-String and use its -Stream switch, then filter out the empty strings:

... | ft ... -a | out-string -s | ? {$_}

--
Kiron