Before reading this page, it's recommended you have a read of Server Variables first. Configuration Variables are created and modified exactly the same way Project Variables are. The only difference is Configuration variables are only usable by the Configuration you create them in and can have their values changes whenever manually starting a build.

Configuration variables have an extra option when creating them, Prompt Type. If a prompt type is set, you will be required to supply a value for that variable when you manually start a build. The prompt type supplied determines the input field in which you supply the value.

 

Example 1 - Text Type/Boolean Prompt Type

In this example, I've created a variable called MakePackages and set it to a Boolean prompt type.

The Configuration this variable belongs to has two stages. Stage 1 builds my project and out puts a bunch of file. Stage 2 takes the output of Stage 1 and generates an installer (a.k.a makes the packages). I don't want to make the packages every time I execute the configuration though so I've setup the configuration to only execute stage 2 when the MakePackages configuration variable is set to true. By making this a prompt type variable, I will be able to supply the value of this variable whenever I manually start a build. When I manually start a build, I will see the following dialog.

Under the Variables heading, you can see the MakePackages variable in a checkbox format. When you create a Boolean prompt type variable, it gets rendered as a checkbox because the value can either be true (checked) or false (unchecked). Now when you manually queue the configuration, you can set the value of the variable by checking or unchecking the checkbox.