The below YAML takes advantage of 2 key Azure Pipeline features / characteristic.
When a variable is not evaluated, the entire variable string is included in the output
Run time expressions
#experiments.yml
trigger:
- master
variables:
ipPattern: '10.112.20.$(System.JobPositionInPhase)' # supposed to not evaluate now but be evaluated in the step
freshInstall: true
noOfVMs: 15
pool:
vmImage: 'windows-2019'
stages:
- stage: ActOnVMs
displayName: 'Perform some action on VMs with contiguous IP addresses'
jobs:
- job:
strategy:
parallel: $[variables['noOfVMs']]
steps:
- pwsh: Write-Host '$(System.JobPositionInPhase). $(ipPattern)'Remember, the hosting agent only provides 1 parallel job in the free tier. You must purchase parallel jobs as necessary. Or if your team has MSDN licenses, each user gets a parallel job in your organization which you can take advantage of in self-hosted pipelines.