Coming from a bash background, PowerShell is consistently annoying. Here's an example, passing an XML file to a cmdlet: Some-Command -Param1 -FileData .\fo

Coming from a bash background, PowerShell is consistently annoying. Here's an example, passing an XML file to a cmdlet: Some-Command -Param1 -FileData .\foobar.xml Cannot process argument transformation on parameter 'FileData'. Cannot convert value ".\foo.xml" to type "System.Byte[]". Error: "Cannot convert value ".\foo.xml" to type "System.Byte". Error: "Input string was not in a correct format."" In bash you would just do: somecommand < foobar.xml Instead you have to create an object and, do a conversion: [Byte[]]$Data = Get-Content -Path ".\foobar.xml" -Encoding Byte -ReadCount 0 Then, run the same command using that object instead of the file: Some-Command -Param1 -FileData $Data