Powershell script monitor does not like newline character

robert777

I'm working with a Powershell script monitor.  In this case pulling down some data from an Openshift Prometheus query.

The query data comes back in JSON.  I'm using the Powershell ConvertFrom-JSON command to create an array of Powershell objects to format for ingest into Solarwinds.

The JSON conversion part works fine.  

My problem:  I sometimes the query returns more than one element.  I want to use the Powershell newline element "`n" to format my output (for the Solarwinds 'Message' return variable) to look something like this...

Pods not running:
rook-ceph-mgr-a-123
rook-ceph-mgr-b-456
rook-ceph-mgr-c-789 

rather than like this...

Pods not running: rook-ceph-mgr-a-123 rook-ceph-mgr-b-456 rook-ceph-mgr-c-789 

I'm using a Powershell array similar to the following: 

$myObject = @()
foreach ($ob in $obs){
$myObject += New-Object psobject @{
POD = $ob.pod
Status = '3'
MSG = $ob.job
}
}
#
$msg1 = "Pods not running:`n"
for ($i=0; $i -lt $myObject.length; $i++)
{$msg1 = $msg1 + 'Job ' + $myObject[$i].msg + ' pod ' + $myObject[$i].pod + "`n"}
}

Notice use of the newline character (`n) to put the description and array elements on separate lines.

This works perfectly in VSCode or PowerShell ISE  - I get a nice block with my header and elements on different lines.

However, attempting to use this in a Solarwinds script monitor the $msg1 variable does not return a block.  I get either nothing or just a single line that I suspect is the last item in the array.

Lots of testing the script definitely seems to choke on the newline character (`n) running in Solarwinds (although not in VCCode/ISE). 

I'm just curious if anyone has success formatting the 'Message' part of a Solarwinds Powershell monitor to return a block with newline characters.

Thanks.

adam.beedell

Do you have a block of code after that to write-host message and statistic?

If no, add that first
if yes, probably worth adding that code block.

In general it doesnt tend to like linebreaks, or arrays of unknown size, you can deal with it by using a string character and then REPLACE()ing that for a linebreak on display, but I think the results parser doesnt like handling it.

It is possible to store and output a whole table but it's a right faff. FOR XML PATH on the sql end sorts it out. I think you're at the output block step though?