Often you may want to sort version strings in PowerShell.
You can use the following methods to do so:
Method 1: Sort Version Strings and Display Output as Strings
$version_strings | Sort-Object { $_ -as [Version] }
This particular example sorts the version strings stored in the array named $version_strings and displays the output as an array of strings.
Method 2: Sort Version Strings and Display Output as Table
$version_strings | ForEach-Object { [Version]$_ } | Sort-Object
This particular example sorts the version strings stored in the array named $version_strings and displays the output as a table that labels the Major, Minor, Build and Revision values of each version string.
The following examples show how to use each of these methods in practice.
Example 1: Sort Version Strings and Display Output as Strings
Suppose that we have the following version strings that we would like to sort:
- 1.1.0.3
- 1.7.0.0
- 1.11.3.1
- 0.2.1.1
We can use the following syntax to do so:
$version_strings = '1.1.0.3', '1.7.0.0', '1.11.3.1', '0.2.1.1'
$version_strings | Sort-Object { $_ -as [Version] }
The following screenshot shows how to use this syntax in practice:
Notice that the output displays the versions strings sorted from smallest to largest.
Example 2: Sort Version Strings and Display Output as Table
Once again, suppose that we have the following version strings that we would like to sort:
- 1.1.0.3
- 1.7.0.0
- 1.11.3.1
- 0.2.1.1
We can use the following syntax to do so:
$version_strings = '1.1.0.3', '1.7.0.0', '1.11.3.1', '0.2.1.1'
$version_strings | ForEach-Object { [Version]$_ } | Sort-Object
The following screenshot shows how to use this syntax in practice:
Notice that the output displays the versions strings sorted from smallest to largest, formatted in a table with labels for the Major, Minor, Build and Revision numbers.
Related Tutorials
The following tutorials explain how to perform other common tasks in PowerShell:
PowerShell: How to Sort a Table with Format-Table
PowerShell: How to Sort by Specific Column
PowerShell: How to Use Sort-Object with Multiple Properties
