Serialize JSON from Powershell in a specific fashion - json

Question

So I have this script that goes out and finds all the software versions installed on machines and lets people know what software and when it was installed across several VMs.
I want to put this on a Dashboard provider we use but they have a specific format in which to use it.
it does produce a valid JSON however I just found out it's not in the format the company wishes.
which would be:
{"table": [["header1", "header2"], ["row1column1", "row1column2"], ["row2column1", "row2column2"]]}
My first thought would be to produce a header row as a beginning variable and then individual variables for each component but that feels very tedious and laborious to create variables for each individual row of data (Date, Name of Software, etc). then at the end combine them into 1 and convert to json
My script is this:
[CmdletBinding()]
Param (
[Parameter(ValueFromPipeline = $true,
ValueFromPipelinebyPropertyName = $true)]
[Alias("Servers")]
[string[]]$Name = (Get-Content "c:\utils\servers.txt")
)
Begin {
}
Process {
$AllComputers = #()
#Gather all computer names before processing
ForEach ($Computer in $Name) {
$AllComputers += $Computer
}
}
End {
ForEach ($Computer in $AllComputers) {
write-output "Checking $computer"
if ($computer -like "*x86*") {
$data = Invoke-Command -cn $computer -ScriptBlock {Get-ItemProperty HKLM:\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall\* | Select-Object #{Label = "ServerName"; Expression = {$env:computername}}, DisplayName, Publisher, DisplayVersion, InstallDate | Where-object { $_.Publisher -match "Foobar" }}
$jsondata += $data
}
else {
$data = Invoke-Command -cn $computer -ScriptBlock { Get-ItemProperty HKLM:\Software\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall\* | Select-Object #{Label = "ServerName"; Expression = {$env:computername}}, DisplayName, Publisher, DisplayVersion, InstallDate | Where-object { $_.Publisher -match "foobar" } }
$jsondata += $data
}
}
$jsondata | ConvertTo-Json -depth 100 | Out-File "\\servername\C$\Utils\InstalledApps.json"
}

Answer 1

From the sample output format provided I would conclude that you are looking for an array of array. There is a "bug" using ConvertTo-Json when trying to do this but since we need it inside a table object anyway. I will show an example using your code but just on my local computer. Integrating this into your code should not be an issue.
# gather the results
$results = Get-ItemProperty HKLM:\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall\* | Where-object { $_.Publisher -match "The" } | Select-Object #{Label = "ServerName"; Expression = {$env:computername}}, DisplayName, Publisher, DisplayVersion, InstallDate
# Prepare an array of arrays for the output.
$outputToBeConverted = #()
# build the header
$header = ($results | Get-Member -MemberType NoteProperty).Name
$outputToBeConverted += ,$header
# Add the rows
Foreach($item in $results){
# Create a string array by calling each property individually
$outputToBeConverted += ,[string[]]($header | ForEach-Object{$item."$_"})
}
[pscustomobject]#{table=$outputToBeConverted} | ConvertTo-Json -Depth 5
Basically it is making a jagged array of arrays where the first member is your "header" and each row is built manually from the items in the $results collection.
You will see the unary operator , used above. That is done to prevent PowerShell from unrolling the array. Without that you could end up with one long array in the output.