[BM] $ApplicationName is empty

PhilipWhite

For some reason the $ApplicationName variable is empty in one of my applications. It's working in the others. The plan is fully working, I can create releases and run the pipelines, etc, but the variable is empty when I use it in scripts.

Maybe also related, on the landing page, it says there are no executions for the app, even though under Releases I have multiple releases that have gone through various stages.

atripp

Hi @PhilipWhite ,

Can you clarify what you mean by empty?

Like, if you were to do Log-Information Hello $ApplicationName!;, it would just log Hello!? Or are you seeing it somewhere else?

There is an $ApplicationName "variable function" that will return the name of the current application in context. There is almost always an application in context, unless you're doing something like a system-level scheduled job or something.

However, variable functions have a low precedence, so if you were to do something like set $ApplicationName = whatever;, it would create a runtime variable called ApplicationName, and then $ApplicationName would resolve to that.

You can explicitly invoke a function by doing $ApplicationName(). So, Log-Information Hello $ApplicationName()!; should always work.

As for nothing showing up on that application page.. that's weird --- but something to dig through separately for sure.

Cheers,
Alana

PhilipWhite

Hi @atripp,

Sorry, I got kind of muddled there; it's actually $EnvironmentName that is empty.
I'm running a script as part of promoting a build to a Test environment. I expect the $EnvironmentName would contain "Test".

atripp

Hi @PhilipWhite ,

Thanks for clarifying!

Long story short, you probably want to just use $PipelineStageName. In your case, it would be which would be "Test" (based on the screenshot that says Test Stage).

Overall, it's a little confusing but Pipeline Stages and Environments are orthogonal concepts:

Environments are used to group servers and scope permissions
Stages define a phase in the deployment/release process (i.e. a pipeline)

A Deployment Target (e.g. "Deploy to XXXXX") is part of a stage, and may be associated with an Environment. Just click "edit", then check "Environment-specific permissions", then select an environment.

That would put an environment in context (and thus $EnvironmentName would return what you expect), but more practically it would:

throw an error if any of the servers used in the execution are not a part of that environment
not allow someone to press the "deploy" or "force" button to that stage , unless they have permissions specific to that environment

It's a little confusing at first, which is why we "kind of" hide environments from the user.

This is most definitely a common point of confusion, so we are really open to feedback if you can think of how to improve documentation/user experience!!

Alana

PhilipWhite

Hi @atripp,
So I associated the deployment targets with environments and that fixed both of my issues: $EnvironmentName is populated and now the environments are showing on that application screen:

Thanks!