Creates a format XML that will be used to display a type.

Format XML is used by Windows PowerShell to determine how objects are displayed.

Most items in PowerShell that come from built-in cmdlets make use of formatters in some
way or another. Write-FormatView simplifies the creation of formatting for a type.


You can format information in three major ways in PowerShell:

- As a table 

- As a list 

- As a custom action 

Write-FormatView supports displaying information in any of these ways. This display
will be applied to any information that would be displayed to the user (or piped into
an Out- cmdlet) that has the typename you specify. A typename can be anything you like,
and it can be set in a short piece of PowerShell script:

$object.psObject.Typenames.Clear() 

$null = $object.psObject.TypeNames.Add("MyTypeName"). 

Since it is so simple to change the type names, it's equally simple to make your own way to
display data, and to write functions that leverage the formatting system in PowerShell to help
you write the information. This can streamline your use of PowerShell, and open up many
new possibilities.

Type Name
One or more type names.

MyCustomTypeName

Property
One or more properties to include in the default type view.

ACustomProperty

Group By Property
If this is set, then the view will be grouped by a property

Wrap
If wrap is set, then items in the table can span multiple lines

Group Label
If this is set, then the view will be labeled with the value of this parameter. If this is not present and -GroupView is not present, the result of the script or property name will be used for the label

Group By Script
If this is set, then the view will be grouped by the result of a script block

Is Selection Set
If set, it will treat the type name as a selection set (a set of predefined types)

Auto Size
If set, the table will be autosized.

As List
If set, then the content will be rendered as a list

Indent
The indentation depth of the custom control

Action
The script block used to fill in the contents of a custom control. The script block can either be an arbitrary script, which will be run, or it can include a number of speicalized commands that will translate into parts of the formatter.

PowerShell has a robust, extensible types system. With Write-TypeView, you can easily add extended type information to any type.
This can include:

The default set of properties to display (-DefaultDisplay) 

Sets of properties to display (-PropertySet) 

Serialization Depth (-SerializationDepth) 

Virtual methods or properties to add onto the type (-ScriptMethod, -ScriptProperty and -NoteProperty) 

Method or property aliasing (-AliasProperty)

Type Name
The name of the type

Serialization Depth
The serialization depth. If the type is deserialized, this is the depth of subpropeties that will be stored. For instance, a serialization depth of 3 would storage an object, it's subproperties, and those objects' subproperties. You can use the serialization depth to minimize the overhead of moving objects back and forth across the remoting boundary, or to ensure that you capture the correct information.

Id Property
The ID property

Hide Property
Will hide any properties in the list from a display

Property Set
Property sets define default views for an object. A property set can be used with Select-Object to display just that set of properties.

Default Display
The default display. If only one propertry is used, this will set the default display property. If more than one property is used, this will set the default display member set

Script Property
A Collection of virtual property names and the script blocks that will be used to get the property values.

Script Method
A collection of virtual method names and the script blocks that will be used to run the virtual method.

Alias Property
A collection of property aliases

Note Property
A collection of fixed property values.

Writes a property set.



Property sets are a way to conveniently access sets of properties on an object.



Instead of writing:

Select-Object a,b,c,d 

You can write:

Select-Object mypropertyset

Type Name
The typename for the property set

Name
The name of the property set

Property Name
The names of the properties to include in the property set