Creating Range of Letters

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Please help me understand this syntax exactly.

I would have wrote it that way:

[code] 65..90 | Foreach-Object { $_ = [char]$_ ;$_} [/code]

I would like to understand what is the thinking of : "$([char]$_):"

please compare the way I wrote it (a two step process)...

I do not understand the use of $ and $_ completely... and this is a perfect learning point for me.

well.. I hope someone will teach me what I'm missing about $  :)

$_ is a placeholder for the current object being passed through the pipeline

"$(...):" is used because we need to append the char representation of the number with a ":"

If you only had "([char]$_):" then you would get:

([char]65):

([char]66):

...

instead of "$([char]$_):" which yields:

A:

B:

...

It isn't too difficult to find a list of ASCII codes for each character by just doing a quick internet search, but I've done that one better.  A few years ago I was doing a project for my college class and I created an Excel spreadsheet, and by using some intricate formulas, I created a character/ASCII converter of sorts.  You type in any character and it will display the ASCII code in the next column.  It took a few hours to perfect, but it's really neat.  I can upload it if anybody would like a copy.