OutputDebugString

OutputDebugString

Writes formatted log messages to the Windows debugger using the Unicode OutputDebugStringW API. Messages can be viewed using an attached debugger or a debug-output listener such as Sysinternals DebugView.

Platform support

This target supports Windows, including Windows PowerShell 5.1 and PowerShell 7. On Linux and macOS, the target silently returns without writing messages, loading Windows interop code, or emitting warnings.

A debugger or listener is not required to enable the target. However, messages are not retained if nothing is listening. Start your listener before writing log messages.

Configuration options

Option	Type	Mandatory	Default	Description
Level	String	No	Default Level	Defines the lowest logging level to write.
Format	String	No	Default Format	Defines the message format using PSLogs format tokens.
PrintException	Boolean	No	$true	Appends the exception message and script stack trace when exception information is passed to Write-Log.

All configuration options are optional.

Example

Add-LoggingTarget -Type OutputDebugString -Configuration @{
    Level = 'DEBUG'
    Format = '[%{timestamp}] [%{level}] %{message}'
    PrintException = $true
}

Write-Log -Level INFO -Message 'Hello, debugger!'
Wait-Logging

For the simplest configuration, use Add-LoggingTarget -Type OutputDebugString to use the module's default level and format.

Exception details

try
{
    Get-Item -Path 'C:\Missing\example.txt' -ErrorAction Stop
}
catch
{
    Write-Log -Level ERROR -Message 'Unable to read the file' -ExceptionInfo $_
}

Wait-Logging

Set PrintException = $false to omit the appended exception details.

See Format for available format tokens and Targets for configuring multiple instances or routing messages using tags.