PowerShell - remove first character if a specific character

Question

 $path = "\path\to\my\file"

I want to simply remove the first \ how do I do that?

I don't want to remove the first character if it's a letter, only if it's \

gravity · Accepted Answer · 2019-07-03T13:04:50.567

7

$path = $path.TrimStart("\")

Would convert $path to path\to\my\file

Take note that subsequent leading backlashes would also be removed as well, so if you had \\\path it would be reduced to path!

edited Jul 03 '19 at 13:04

answered Jul 02 '19 at 20:20

gravity

3

you may want to mention that the `.Trim()` variants trim the _characters as individual chars_ in the parens ... and trim ALL OF THEM. so, your code would trim away **_all_** the leading backslash characters. that is fine when you expect it ... but truly disconcerting when it happens unexpectedly. [*grin*] – Lee_Dailey Jul 02 '19 at 21:15
... as I [noticed](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/70171826/archive-folder-without-some-subfolders-and-files-using-powershell/70173927#70173927) while trying to trim `.\` from a relative path when zipping. – Rich Moss Dec 02 '21 at 19:07

score 2 · Answer 2 · answered Jul 03 '19 at 13:13

2

You could use the regex -replace operator:

$path = $path -replace '^\\'

This will remove exactly 1 backslash from the start of the string

answered Jul 03 '19 at 13:13

Mathias R. Jessen

2 Answers2