Introduction ‘Plot Graph in PowerShell Console’:

Recently, I was working on my Twitter bot (https://twitter.com/WittyHumorBot) completely written in PowerShell, but part of which was automating multiple jobs that run continuously on my screen. I managed to write a script to set all PowerShell consoles automatically in a grid layout like in the below image

Graph in Powershell console

But I was not able to do that with taskmgr.exe in order to monitor performance bottlenecks and which was not at all customizable to my needs.

Graph in Powershell console

Features and Script:

So I decided to write a function that is customizable and can display a graph in a Powershell console which can also be set in an Automated grid layout ( Here is the Grid layout script and the blog post).

Also,

  • I want to Color-code the output depending upon the Value of the Datapoint; Above/below some predefined thresholds 

    Graph in Powershell console

  • Display custom information  on X and Y-Axis labels 

    Graph in Powershell console

  • A Graph in the console that is independent and fully customizable, not like Task Manager’s (no need to switch to Performance Tab) and,
  • which could be easily used in any Powershell script to monitor performance on any defined parameter, which I see as the biggest benefit of the function.
  • The function consumes data points, generated during script execution or Pre-stored data like from a file or database.Graph in Powershell console

Following is the full script and here is the link to the Github Project, please feel free to contribute as I still see some possibilities of improvement.


<#
.SYNOPSIS
Draws graph in the Powershell console
.DESCRIPTION
Consumes datapoints and draws colored coded fully customizable graph in the Powershell console.
.PARAMETER Datapoints
Array of data points which is to be plotted on the graph
.PARAMETER XAxisTitle
Label on the X-Axis
.PARAMETER YAxisTitle
Label on the Y-Axis
.EXAMPLE
Show-Graph -Datapoints $Datapoints
.EXAMPLE
Show-Graph -Datapoints $Datapoints -XAxisTitle "Avg. CPU utilization" -YAxisTitle "Percentage"
.NOTES
Blog: https://geekeefy.wordpress.com/
Author: https://twitter.com/SinghPrateik
Features and Benefits:
* Color-coded output depending upon the Value of Datapoint
* Custom X an Y-Axis labels
* Graph in console is independent and fully customizable, not like Task Manager (Performance Tab)
* Could be incorporated in Powershell scripts
* Can consume datapoints generated during script run or Pre stored data like in a file or database.
#>
Function Show-Graph {
[cmdletbinding()]
[alias("Graph")]
Param(
# Parameter help description
[Parameter(Mandatory=$true)]
[int[]] $Datapoints,
[String] $XAxisTitle = 'X-Axis',
[String] $YAxisTitle = 'Y Axis'
)
$NumOfDatapoints = $Datapoints.Count
$NumOfLabelsOnYAxis = 10
$XAxis = " "+"-"*($NumOfDatapoints+3)
$YAxisTitleAlphabetCounter = 0
$YAxisTitleStartIdx = 1
$YAxisTitleEndIdx = $YAxisTitleStartIdx + $YAxisTitle.Length -1
If($YAxisTitle.Length -gt $NumOfLabelsOnYAxis){
Write-Warning "No. Alphabets in YAxisTitle [$($YAxisTitle.Length)] can't be greator than no. of Labels on Y-Axis [$NumOfLabelsOnYAxis]"
Write-Warning "YAxisTitle will be cropped"
}
If($XAxisTitle.Length -gt $XAxis.length-3){
$XAxisLabel = " "+$XAxisTitle
}else{
$XAxisLabel = " "+(" "*(($XAxis.Length – $XAxisTitle.Length)/2))+$XAxisTitle
}
# Create a 2D Array to save datapoints in a 2D format
$Array = New-Object 'object[,]' ($NumOfLabelsOnYAxis+1),$NumOfDatapoints
$Count = 0
$Datapoints | ForEach-Object {
$r = [Math]::Floor($_/10)
$Array[$r,$Count] = [char] 9608
1..$R | ForEach-Object {$Array[$_,$Count] = [char] 9608}
$Count++
}
# Draw graph
For($i=10;$i -gt 0;$i–){
$Row = ''
For($j=0;$j -lt $NumOfDatapoints;$j++){
$Cell = $Array[$i,$j]
$String = If([String]::IsNullOrWhiteSpace($Cell)){' '}else{$Cell}
$Row = [string]::Concat($Row,$String)
}
$YAxisLabel = $i*10
# Condition to fix the spacing issue of a 3 digit vs 2 digit number [like 100 vs 90] on the Y-Axis
If("$YAxisLabel".length -lt 3){$YAxisLabel = (" "*(3-("$YAxisLabel".length)))+$YAxisLabel}
If($i -in $YAxisTitleStartIdx..$YAxisTitleEndIdx){
$YAxisLabelAlphabet = $YAxisTitle[$YAxisTitleAlphabetCounter]+" "
$YAxisTitleAlphabetCounter++
}
else {
$YAxisLabelAlphabet = ' '
}
# To color the graph depending upon the datapoint value
If ($i -gt 7) {Write-Host $YAxisLabelAlphabet -ForegroundColor DarkYellow -NoNewline ;Write-Host "$YAxisLabel|" -NoNewline; Write-Host $Row -ForegroundColor Red}
elseif ($i -le 7 -and $i -gt 4) {Write-Host $YAxisLabelAlphabet -ForegroundColor DarkYellow -NoNewline ;Write-Host "$YAxisLabel|" -NoNewline; Write-Host $Row -ForegroundColor Yellow}
elseif($i -le 4 -and $i -ge 1) {Write-Host $YAxisLabelAlphabet -ForegroundColor DarkYellow -NoNewline ;Write-Host "$YAxisLabel|" -NoNewline; Write-Host $Row -ForegroundColor Green}
else {Write-Host "$YAxisLabel|"}
}
$XAxis # Prints X-Axis horizontal line
Write-Host $XAxisLabel -ForegroundColor DarkYellow # Prints XAxisTitle
}
#$Datapoints = (1..100|Get-Random -Count 50)
#Show-Graph -Datapoints $Datapoints -XAxisTitle "Avg. CPU utilization" -YAxisTitle "Percentage"
view raw

Show-Graph.ps1

hosted with ❤ by GitHub

Hope you’ll find the script useful and Thanks for reading.

Please do follow me on twitter for more Interesting PowerShell material and don’t forget to Showoff your Powershell console graph to your colleagues, Cheers! 😉

Optical Character Recognition

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