Saving an XML file in powershell requires complete path. Why?

Question

I am using the XML capabilities of powershell to modify a .config file. Calling XMLDocument.Save doesn't have any effect, unless I supply the complete path name.

# Open the xml file
$config = [xml](get-content web.config)
#
# modify the XML
$config.SelectNodes("./configuration/connectionStrings/add[@name='LocalSqlServer']") | % { $connNode = $_ }
$connNode.connectionString = $connNode.connectionString -replace '^(.*)Server=[^;]+(.*)$', '$1Server=192.168.5.2$2'
#
#
# Now I save it again
#
# This doesn't save it!
$config.Save("web.config");
# However, this works
$config.Save("{0}\\web.config" -f (get-location));

Why doesn't $config.Save("web.config") work?

Did I end up saving it somewhere else, other than my local directory?

James · Accepted Answer · 2011-01-29 10:30:45Z

101

The reason is because the current working directory in powershell isn't necessarly the same as the process working directory.

This is because the powershell working direction ( Get-Location ) can make use of the different filesystem providers - such as the Registry or Certificates. Also because powershell can have multiple runspaces, each one can have their own current working directory.

There are two workarounds to this.

One is to use Resolve-Path (Resolve-Path "orders.xml"), although this will check existence prior to returning the value, so for creation of new files, this may be an issue. The other option is to use the alias of get-location : $pwd for instance ("$pwd\orders.xml")

So for your example you could either change line 2 to be

$config = [xml](get-content (Resolve-Path "web.config"))

or

$config = [xml](get-content "$pwd\web.config")

and respectivly line 12 to be

$config.Save((Resolve-Path "web.config"));

or

$config.Save("$pwd\web.config");

answered Jan 29, 2011 at 10:30

James

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1 Comment

Kon Over a year ago

Good stuff. Very informative and helped me find my issue. Thanks!

mjolinor · Accepted Answer · 2011-01-27 22:27:31Z

29

If it didn't go to the current working directory, I'd check $home.

answered Jan 27, 2011 at 22:27

mjolinor

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1 Comment

OldFart Over a year ago

Set-Location (aka cd) in PowerShell does not change the current directory maintined by the OS, so the current directory normally stays wherever it was when you started PowerShell. If you want to change the current directory, you can set the [Environment]::CurrentDirectory property.

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