Passing data between build steps in Jenkins

One thing remains between shells: the workspace.
Simple and stupid solution: use file(s)!

Huge additional advantage: it works when you split your job in several jobs and use the Clone Workspace plugin

Build Step #1 - Execute shell

START=timestamp...echo $START > env_start.txt

...

Build Step #3 - Execute Shell

START=`cat env_start.txt`END=timestampTIME_LAPSED=$END-$START

If you are using the declarative pipeline syntax defining a variable in the environment section and using a script step to set its value may be useful.

I'm doing something like this with a declarative pipeline and it works for passing a variable (both inside one stage and between stages):

pipeline {        agent any        environment {            variable = ''        }        stages {            stage('Some stage') {                 steps {                    script {                        if (some condition){                            variable = 'some value'                        } else { variable = 'else value' }                    }                                    sh '${somepath}/bin/script ' +                         "-parameter=${variable}"                    }                }            }            stage('Dummy print') {                steps {                    sh "echo ${variable}"                }            }[...]

We use inject environment variables plugin extensively and it works great.The solution is:

1. Set your variable myenv=value1
2. print to file in workspace: echo "myenv=$myenv" > tmp.myenv
3. Inject after every change: Use envinject to read environment from file tmp.myenv -> myenv is now known as part of the job environment.