I’m trying to get text from a page and then use that text further down in the spec to assert on another element.

I’ve pasted a very simple spec you can run that shows you can’t return a value from a function if the function’s return statement is inside a protractor promise return txt; (line 24)…

describe('My Test', function () {

    var tempVariable;



    it('should go get some text from the page', function () {

        browser.get('https://angularjs.org/');

        tempVariable = getTextFromElement();    //it appears javascript immediately sets this variable before waiting for protractor to return the value

    });



    it('should do some random other stuff', function () {

        element.all(by.cssContainingText('a', 'Learn')).get(0).click();

        element.all(by.cssContainingText('a', 'Case Studies')).get(0).click();

        element.all(by.cssContainingText('a', ' Home')).get(0).click();

    });



    it('should be able to use the text from the first page in this test', function () {

        console.log('ntempVariable: ' + tempVariable);    //this is undefined!

        expect(typeof tempVariable).not.toBe('undefined', 'failed: tempVariable was undefined!');

    });

});



function getTextFromElement() {

    $('a.learn-link').getText().then(function (txt) {

        console.log('nInitial text:   ' + txt);

        return txt;     //how do we return this so it's available to other 'it' blocks?

    });

}

Updated snippet of code following @alecxe answer and my comment.

I am attempting to contruct an object from various text on a page and return it to assert on in a later page...

function getRandomProductFromList() {

    var Product = function (line, name, subname, units) {

        this.line       = line;

        this.name       = name;

        this.subname    = subname;

        this.units      = units;

    };



    var myProduct = new Product();



    myProduct.line = 'Ford';

    myProduct.units = 235;



    //select a random product on the page and add it to 'myProduct'

    var allProducts = element.all('div.product');

    allProducts.count().then(function (count) {

        var randomIndex = Math.floor(Math.random() * count);

        var productName = allProducts.get(randomIndex);



        productName.getText().then(function (prodName) {

            myProduct.name = prodName;

            productName.click();

        });

    });



    //If a sub-product can be chosen, select it and add it to 'myProduct'

    var subproduct = $('div.subproduct');

    subproduct.isDisplayed().then(function (subProductExists) {

        if (subProductExists) {

            subproduct.getText().then(function (subProductName) {

                myProduct.subname = subProductName;

            });

            subproduct.click();

        }

    }, function (err) {});



    return myProduct;

}