Powershell format-table error

Question

I am attempting to run the following code to retrieve a list of local users on a machine.

gwmi win32_useraccount -Computername $env:computername -Filter "Domain='$env:computername'" |
  Format-Table Name,Description

I get this error when running inside a PS1 file:

 The object of type
 "Microsoft.PowerShell.Commands.Internal.Format.FormatStartData" is not
 valid or not in the correct sequence. This is likely caused by a
 user-specified "f ormat-table" command which is conflicting with the
 default formatting.
     + CategoryInfo          : InvalidData: (:) [out-lineoutput],
 InvalidOperationException
     + FullyQualifiedErrorId :
 ConsoleLineOutputOutOfSequencePacket,Microsoft.PowerShell.Commands.OutLineOutputCommand

I understand this issue arises because of the way the pipelines are parsed but I can't figure out how to get around it.

kindzmarauli · Accepted Answer · 2025-07-03 16:51:34Z

23

The Format-* cmdlets do not do final output, but transform their input into a sequence of formatting objects. These formatting objects are converted to the actual output by one of the Out- cmdlets, probably Out-Default.

If a script has multiple, different sets of formatting objects that final output of the merged objects from all the expressions in the script Out-Default cannot resolve the inconsistencies.

Fix: add a Out-String to the end of each output generating pipeline to perform the formatting one expression at a time:

gwmi win32_useraccount -Computername $env:computername -Filter "Domain='$env:computername'" |
  Format-Table Name,Description | Out-String

edited Jul 3 at 16:51

kindzmarauli

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answered Sep 22, 2011 at 15:55

Richard

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2 Comments

JPBlanc Over a year ago

I do not reproduce with this command on my seven, But it appends to me with other WMI class.

Richard Over a year ago

@manojlds The problem comes when running multiple output producing statements together in a single execution. You can get the same on the command line by having two commands together on a single command line with the ; statement separator. In some cases it works, in others it doesn't. But forcing output to be strings which are displayed directly has always worked for me.

JPBlanc · Accepted Answer · 2011-09-22 15:59:54Z

1

you can also try :

gwmi win32_useraccount -Computername $env:computername -Filter "Domain='$env:computername'"  | Select-Object Name,Description  | Format-Table Name,Description

In fact you convert to an intermediate PSCustomObject and you still have an object.

answered Sep 22, 2011 at 15:59

JPBlanc

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