PowerShell / PowerShell/PSScriptAnalyzer

PSPossibleIncorrectComparisonWithNull fails to work with typecasted variables

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Area - Rules Issue - Enhancement
Dominant language
C#
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Forks
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Avg merge
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Merged PRs (30d)
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Description

Steps to reproduce

If you validate this script, it complains about PSPossibleIncorrectComparisonWithNull even though it is pretty clear $value must be a string.

Function Get-FooBar() {
    return "foobar"
}

[string]$value = (Get-FooBar)

if ($value -eq $null) {
    Write-Output 'value is $null'
} else {
    Write-Output 'value is not $null'
}

Expected behavior

It works perfectly fine if the value is type-casted like this:

Function Get-FooBar() {
    return "foobar"
}

$value = (Get-FooBar) -as [string]

if ($value -eq $null) {
    Write-Output 'value is $null'
} else {
    Write-Output 'value is not $null'
}

Actual behavior

So we get this error needlessly.

ERROR: test.ps1:9:5: PSPossibleIncorrectComparisonWithNull $null should be on the left side of equality comparisons.

Environment data

> $PSVersionTable
Name                           Value                                                                                               
----                           -----                                                                                               
PSVersion                      6.0.2                                                                                               
PSEdition                      Core                                                                                                
GitCommitId                    v6.0.2                                                                                              
OS                             Linux 4.15.10-1.el7.elrepo.x86_64 #1 SMP Thu Mar 15 10:05:52 EDT 2018                               
Platform                       Unix                                                                                                
PSCompatibleVersions           {1.0, 2.0, 3.0, 4.0...}                                                                             
PSRemotingProtocolVersion      2.3                                                                                                 
SerializationVersion           1.1.0.1                                                                                             
WSManStackVersion              3.0     

> (Get-Module -ListAvailable PSScriptAnalyzer).Version | ForEach-Object { $_.ToString() }
1.16.1

Contributor guide

Open the contributing guide

First steps

  1. Read the whole issue, then the project's contributing guide.
  2. Comment on the issue to say you are picking it up — it saves two people doing the same work.
  3. Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
  4. Open a pull request that references the issue number.

Research direction

Start with the PSPossibleIncorrectComparisonWithNull rule and reproduce the warning using the first PowerShell script, then compare it with the -as [string] example. Trace the rule's handling of explicitly typecast variables and add or update coverage so the warning is not emitted for the demonstrated safe comparison while existing cases remain covered.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Tech stack
powershell
Domain
tooling
Issue type
Bug
Difficulty
3/5
Estimated time
1-2 days
Activity status
Stale
Clarity
Clearly specified
Newbie friendliness
48/100

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