PowerShell command line parameters and '--'
command-line, powershell, powershell-2.0
Solution
A double hyphen instructs PowerShell to treat everything coming after as literal arguments rather than options, so that you can pass for instance a literal `-foo` to your script/application/cmdlet.
Example:
PS C:\> echo "-bar" | select-string -bar
Select-String : A parameter cannot be found that matches parameter name 'bar'.
At line:1 char:28
+ "-bar" | select-string -bar <<<<
+ CategoryInfo : InvalidArgument: (:) [Select-String], ParameterBindingException
+ FullyQualifiedErrorId : NamedParameterNotFound,Microsoft.PowerShell.Commands.SelectStringCommand
vs.
PS C:\> echo "-bar" | select-string -- -bar
-bar
To avoid this behavior you must either quote (`"--"`, `'--'`) or escape (``--`) the double hyphen.
Problem
For whatever reason, when I try to call a C# program I'm writing, and I try to pass two arguments with '--' in the command line, PowerShell doesn't call the program with my command line. For instance, I'm providing the command line: ``` .\abc.exe foo.txt -- bar -- ``` When I call this, the C# program's main only gets the command line arguments: ``` foo.txt bar -- ``` instead of ``` foo.txt -- bar -- ``` as would be expected. Why would this be happening? BTW, if I call it as: ``` .\abc.exe foo.txt '--' bar '--' ``` it works as expected. Also, calling it as: ``` & .\abc.exe foo.txt -- bar -- ``` Doesn't seem to help. My reason for thinking this is a PowerShell weirdness is that if I run the same command line from CMD.EXE, everything works as expected.