terraform VS terragrunt

Claude also created the IAC for deploying the app on Hetzner, using Terraform as the configuration tool. I only had to provide my Hetzner API key for VPS resource provisioning and my Cloudflare API key for domain name DNS entry management. 🌐

Terraform Installed: Download and install Terraform from the website: https://www.terraform.io/

Download Terraform from the Terraform website.

Terraform is an infrastructure as code tool that replaces the ClickOps method of defining, deploying, and managing infrastructure locally, on-premises, or in the cloud. Its declarative method of defining infrastructure lets you focus on the target state of the infrastructure rather than the steps needed to achieve that state, which makes managing infrastructure easier.

Terraform and Pulumi automate the provisioning of cloud resources. IaC ensures consistency and eliminates manual errors when setting up infrastructure.

As part of the task, I also needed to build the necessary infrastructure in AWS. The client organization primarily relied on “click-ops,” manually configuring resources through the AWS Management Console, and had not yet embraced Infrastructure as Code (IaC). Since we wanted to introduce IaC to streamline processes, I asked my boss if they had a preferred tool, such as Terraform, AWS CDK, or Pulumi. Their response was vague: “Any tool will do.”

Terraform

HashiCorp Terraform and Vault form a powerful combination in the DevSecOps landscape, embedding security into infrastructure provisioning and secrets management.

Automate Add-on Management: Kubernetes Operators and Infrastructure-as-Code (IaC) tools like Terraform reduce manual effort by automating add-on lifecycles and updates.

Link: https://terragrunt.gruntwork.io

name: Deploy on: push: branches: - main pull_request: branches: - main jobs: terraform: runs-on: ubuntu-latest steps: - name: Checkout repository uses: actions/checkout@v2 - name: Setup SSH uses: webfactory/[email protected] with: ssh-private-key: ${{ secrets.SSH_PRIVATE_KEY }} - name: Setup Terraform uses: hashicorp/setup-terraform@v2 with: terraform_version: 1.5.5 terraform_wrapper: false - name: Setup Terragrunt run: | curl -LO "https://github.com/gruntwork-io/terragrunt/releases/download/v0.48.1/terragrunt_linux_amd64" chmod +x terragrunt_linux_amd64 sudo mv terragrunt_linux_amd64 /usr/local/bin/terragrunt terragrunt -v - name: Apply Terraform changes run: | cd dev terragrunt run-all apply -auto-approve --terragrunt-non-interactive -var AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID=$AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID -var AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY=$AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY -var AWS_REGION=$AWS_DEFAULT_REGION cd bastion-ec2 ip=$(terragrunt output instance_public_ip) echo "$ip" echo "$ip" > public_ip.txt cat public_ip.txt pwd env: AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID: ${{ secrets.AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID }} AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY: ${{ secrets.AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY }} AWS_DEFAULT_REGION: ${{ secrets.AWS_DEFAULT_REGION }}

Terraform. I use it to manage infrastructure. It simplifies many things if at least a few people work on a project. As the project grows, it becomes massive, and maybe for better state management, you will need tools like Terragrunt to keep infrastructure-related code simple. If you use AWS as a cloud provider, you can also use AWS CDK. It’s a nice tool with Typescript support, but it’s available only for AWS, and if you need something from a different cloud infrastructure, the code will be much more complex than Terraform. That’s why I prefer the Terraform even for AWS.

You need to ensure your Action code is built before you attempt a terrform plan or apply. In our case we are using terragrunt which has a helpful before_hook, setup in the terragrunt.hcl file as follows:

https://github.com/hashicorp/terraform/issues/19932

My understanding is that people that have this as a first-class concern use something like Terragrunt to dynamically generate the HCL as needed.

https://terragrunt.gruntwork.io/

For Burrow here, I was was focused on shipping something and didn't want to spend time on generating that code just yet. But the project has gotten some attention so if this is a recurring request I'll probably do it.

Note that I intentionally chose the 17 AWS regions that are default enabled in every new AWS account, so it should only be if you want to customize it that this becomes important.

A Cloudformation Stacks based deployment to achieve multi-region would be another good (and perhaps better) option here. I could add that to the Makefile, with inspiration from your link there.

Terragrunt started to use OpenTofu as the default IAC tool, however, this was not a major release; instead, it was provided as a patch and users didn't expect to have any differences in the behavior. The original problem may be found here.

Next, head over to the Terragrunt GitHub page to download it.

Terragrunt is a Terraform wrapper, designed to fill in the gaps when it comes to large scale Terraform configurations.