Postman Environment Variables: Current Value vs Initial Value disparity in Newman
28K reputation · 24 Sept 2023, 12:18 UTC
Postman distinguishes between Initial Value, which is synced to the cloud and shared across team workspaces, and Current Value, which is stored locally on the user's machine to prevent sensitive data leakage.
When transitioning a collection from a local desktop environment to a production CI/CD pipeline using the Newman CLI, the execution relies on exported environment JSON files. There is a known risk where configurations working in the Postman app fail during automated runs because the exported file may not capture the local overrides present in the Current Value field.
Given the variable precedence hierarchy (Global > Environment > Collection > Data files), what is the documented behavior for Newman when an environment file contains both value and current_value keys? Which field takes priority during a headless execution, and how can this be verified without risking the exposure of production secrets in the shared Initial Value field?