How do I use Jenkins Pipeline properties step?

Question

I am studying capabilities of Jenkins Pipeline:Multibranch. It is said that a recently introduced properties step might be useful there, but I can't catch how it works and what is its purpose.

Its hint message doesn't seem to be very clear:

Updates the properties of the job which runs this step. Mainly useful from multibranch workflows, so that Jenkinsfile itself can encode what would otherwise be static job configuration.

So I created a new Pipeline with this as a script (pasted directly into Jenkins not in SCM):

properties [[$class: 'ParametersDefinitionProperty',
   parameterDefinitions: [[$class: 'StringParameterDefinition',
       defaultValue: '', description: '', name: 'PARAM1']]
]]

I ran it and nothing happened, job didn't received a new parameter and even if it did I don't get why I might need this. Could anyone please explain?

UPDATE1: I tried putting a dummy Pipeline with properties step into my git repo, then configured a multibranch job.

println 1
properties [[$class: 'ParametersDefinitionProperty', parameterDefinitions: [[$class: 'StringParameterDefinition', defaultValue: 'str1', description: '', name: 'PARAM1']]], [$class: 'RebuildSettings', autoRebuild: false, rebuildDisabled: false]]
println 2

It found my branch, created a job but the build failed with:

groovy.lang.MissingPropertyException: No such property: properties for class: groovy.lang.Binding
at groovy.lang.Binding.getVariable(Binding.java:62)
at org.jenkinsci.plugins.scriptsecurity.sandbox.groovy.SandboxInterceptor.onGetProperty(SandboxInterceptor.java:185)
at org.kohsuke.groovy.sandbox.impl.Checker$4.call(Checker.java:241)
at org.kohsuke.groovy.sandbox.impl.Checker.checkedGetProperty(Checker.java:238)
at com.cloudbees.groovy.cps.sandbox.SandboxInvoker.getProperty(SandboxInvoker.java:23)
at com.cloudbees.groovy.cps.impl.PropertyAccessBlock.rawGet(PropertyAccessBlock.java:17)
at WorkflowScript.run(WorkflowScript:2)
at ___cps.transform___(Native Method)
at com.cloudbees.groovy.cps.impl.PropertyishBlock$ContinuationImpl.get(PropertyishBlock.java:62)
at com.cloudbees.groovy.cps.LValueBlock$GetAdapter.receive(LValueBlock.java:30)
at com.cloudbees.groovy.cps.impl.PropertyishBlock$ContinuationImpl.fixName(PropertyishBlock.java:54)
at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke0(Native Method)
at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(NativeMethodAccessorImpl.java:57)
at sun.reflect.DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.java:43)
at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Method.java:601)
at com.cloudbees.groovy.cps.impl.ContinuationPtr$ContinuationImpl.receive(ContinuationPtr.java:72)
at com.cloudbees.groovy.cps.impl.ConstantBlock.eval(ConstantBlock.java:21)
at com.cloudbees.groovy.cps.Next.step(Next.java:58)
at com.cloudbees.groovy.cps.Continuable.run0(Continuable.java:154)
at org.jenkinsci.plugins.workflow.cps.SandboxContinuable.access$001(SandboxContinuable.java:19)
at org.jenkinsci.plugins.workflow.cps.SandboxContinuable$1.call(SandboxContinuable.java:33)
at org.jenkinsci.plugins.workflow.cps.SandboxContinuable$1.call(SandboxContinuable.java:30)
at org.jenkinsci.plugins.scriptsecurity.sandbox.groovy.GroovySandbox.runInSandbox(GroovySandbox.java:106)
at org.jenkinsci.plugins.workflow.cps.SandboxContinuable.run0(SandboxContinuable.java:30)
at org.jenkinsci.plugins.workflow.cps.CpsThread.runNextChunk(CpsThread.java:164)
at org.jenkinsci.plugins.workflow.cps.CpsThreadGroup.run(CpsThreadGroup.java:277)
at org.jenkinsci.plugins.workflow.cps.CpsThreadGroup.access$000(CpsThreadGroup.java:77)
at org.jenkinsci.plugins.workflow.cps.CpsThreadGroup$2.call(CpsThreadGroup.java:186)
at org.jenkinsci.plugins.workflow.cps.CpsThreadGroup$2.call(CpsThreadGroup.java:184)
at org.jenkinsci.plugins.workflow.cps.CpsVmExecutorService$2.call(CpsVmExecutorService.java:47)
at java.util.concurrent.FutureTask$Sync.innerRun(FutureTask.java:334)
at java.util.concurrent.FutureTask.run(FutureTask.java:166)
at hudson.remoting.SingleLaneExecutorService$1.run(SingleLaneExecutorService.java:112)
at jenkins.util.ContextResettingExecutorService$1.run(ContextResettingExecutorService.java:28)
at java.util.concurrent.Executors$RunnableAdapter.call(Executors.java:471)
at java.util.concurrent.FutureTask$Sync.innerRun(FutureTask.java:334)
at java.util.concurrent.FutureTask.run(FutureTask.java:166)
at java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor.runWorker(ThreadPoolExecutor.java:1110)
at java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor$Worker.run(ThreadPoolExecutor.java:603)
at java.lang.Thread.run(Thread.java:722)

UPDATE2: when I put the same script (as in UPD1) back into Jenkins and runs it, it asked for new permission method groovy.lang.GroovyObject getProperty java.lang.String. I approved it, the build went green, however, still no changes to the job configuration appeared.

My env is: Jenkins 1.625.3, Pipeline+Multibranch 1.13

Answer 1

Using properties with explicit method syntax will work, i.e.:
properties( [ ... ] ) rather than properties [ ... ]

Alternatively, it will work without if you specify the parameter name, e.g.:

properties properties: [ ... ]

For example defining three properties is as easy as :

properties([
  parameters([
    string(name: 'submodule', defaultValue: ''),
    string(name: 'submodule_branch', defaultValue: ''),
    string(name: 'commit_sha', defaultValue: ''),
  ])
])

/* Accessible then with : params.submodule, params.submodule_branch...  */