String concatenation in PowerShell

Strings concatenation in PowerShell is an everyday task for almost any Windows IT staff or Microsoft platform developer today. There are a few ways to accomplish this

Our variables

$hello = "Hello"
$world = "World"

The ordinary usage

Using built-in methods in PowerShell

# Concatenated using +
$concatenatedString = $hello + " "  + $world  +  "!"
 
# Using embedded variables
$embeddedString = "$hello $world!"
 
# Using string.Format powershell version (-f for format)
$formattedString = "{0} {1}!" -f $hello, $world

Using native .net methods

# Using string.Concat
$concatenateString = [System.String]::Concat($hello, " ", $world, "!")
 
# Using string.Format
$formattedString = [System.String]::Format("{0} {1}!", $hello, $world)

Preference

That is up to you, performance-wise there is little or no difference when doing a million cycles. My personal preference would be the native .net methods since thats what I'm used to read and I like to keep things simple.

What will happend with line breaks using the different methods

Concatenated using + with line breaks

$concatenatedString = $hello + 
    " "  + 
    $world  +  
    "! "

Returns the entire string in one line

Hello World!

Using embedded variables

$embeddedString = 
    "$hello 
    $world!"

Returns a line broken string

Hello 
    World!

Using string.Format powershell version (-f for format)

$formattedString = "{0} 
    {1}!" -f $hello, $world

Returns a line broken string

Hello 
    World!

Using string.Concat

$concatenateString = 
    [System.String]::Concat($hello, 
        " ", $world, 
        "!")

Returns the entire string in one line

Hello World!

Using string.Format

$formattedString = 
    [System.String]::Format(
        "{0} {1}!", 
        $hello, $world)

Returns the entire string in one line

Hello World!

Using string.Format

$formattedString = 
    [System.String]::Format(
        "{0} 
        {1}!", 
        $hello, $world)

Returns a line broken string

Hello 
        World!