Powershell split() vs -split - what's the difference?

Question

After struggling with this for half an hour, I\'ve experienced this difference when splitting a string with spaces, depending on which syntax you use.

Simple string:

Answer 1

1. .Net object does not take regex but interprets it as a literal string.

   $line = "1: 2: 3: 4: 5: "
   $ln = $line.split("\s")
   $ln
   

Output:

1: 2: 3: 4: 5: 

Hence, in your example, the "+" is ignored as it it not found in $ln but ":\s" is used for splitting:

$ln = $line.split(":\s+")
$ln

Output: 

1
 2
 3
 4
 5

which is same as

$ln = $line.split(":")
$ln

2.while powershell -split operator interprets "\s" as a valid regex i.e., space. Since, it can find both : and \s in the string, the combination of ":\s" is used for splitting. eg:

$line = "1:2:3: 4: 5: "
$ln = $line -split ":"
$ln

output:

1
2
3
 4
 5