Setting a result from task in an azure pipeline variable

Question

I have setup a in my azure pipeline which create a Redis cache instance through Azure CLI. There is another task which runs afterwards that pick set the values in my application config file from a pipeline variable named "CacheConnectionKey".

I have to set the variable value manually in the pipeline. I want to automate this process by adding a new task in between both described above. The new task should get PrimaryKey from Redis cache instance and set the value in the pipeline variable (i.e. CacheConnectionKey).

There is a command I have tried in the power shell which is giving me the access keys:

Get-AzRedisCacheKey -ResourceGroupName "MyResourceGroup" -Name "MyCacheKey"
PrimaryKey        : pJ+jruGKPHDKsEC8kmoybobH3TZx2njBR3ipEsquZFo=
SecondaryKey      : sJ+jruGKPHDKsEC8kmoybobH3TZx2njBR3ipEsquZFo=

Now I want to set PrimaryKey resulting from this command to be set in the pipeline variable CacheConnectionKey so that the next process could use the value properly.

Do you want to use this in the same run? the same job? Or in another run of the pipeline? — Krzysztof Madej, Jul 02 '21 at 17:47
I want to use it in the same run of the pipeline, but in a different job. — Hassan, Jul 06 '21 at 05:50

score 1 · Answer 1 · answered Jul 05 '21 at 08:11

The "process" referred in the question could be anything like a run/job/stage/pipeline I suppose. Regardless, in YAML pipelines, you can set variables at the root, stage, and job level. You can also use a variable group to make variables available across multiple pipelines. Some tasks define output variables, which you can consume in downstream steps, jobs, and stages.

In YAML, you can access variables across jobs and stages by using dependencies. By default, each stage in a pipeline depends on the one just before it in the YAML file. So if you need to refer to a stage that isn't immediately prior to the current one, you can override this automatic default by adding a dependsOn section to the stage.

For example, let's assume you have a task called MyTask, which sets an output variable called MyVar.

To use outputs in the same job:

steps:
- task: MyTask@1  # this step generates the output variable
  name: ProduceVar  # because we're going to depend on it, we need to name the step
- script: echo $(ProduceVar.MyVar) # this step uses the output variable

To use outputs in a different job:

jobs:
- job: A
  steps:
  # assume that MyTask generates an output variable called "MyVar"
  - task: MyTask@1
    name: ProduceVar  # because we're going to depend on it, we need to name the step
- job: B
  dependsOn: A
  variables:
    # map the output variable from A into this job
    varFromA: $[ dependencies.A.outputs['ProduceVar.MyVar'] ]
  steps:
  - script: echo $(varFromA) # this step uses the mapped-in variable

For more details on the syntax and examples, check the following articles:

how does MyTask work.. I have this exact code example yaml stuff and getting nothing on echo job B — Erik, Aug 19 '21 at 13:44

Setting a result from task in an azure pipeline variable

1 Answers1