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Alex Spinov
Alex Spinov

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Terraform Has a Free API — Infrastructure as Code for Any Cloud

#terraform #tutorial #devops #cloud

Terraform is the industry-standard Infrastructure as Code tool by HashiCorp — define your entire cloud infrastructure in declarative config files, version it in Git, and deploy with one command.

Why Terraform?

  • Multi-cloud — AWS, GCP, Azure, DigitalOcean, Cloudflare, 3000+ providers
  • Declarative — describe the desired state, Terraform figures out how to get there
  • Plan before apply — preview changes before executing them
  • State management — tracks what exists vs what you want
  • Modules — reusable infrastructure components
  • Free and open source — OpenTofu fork also available

Quick Start 

# Install
brew install terraform
# or
curl -fsSL https://releases.hashicorp.com/terraform/1.9.0/terraform_1.9.0_linux_amd64.zip -o tf.zip && unzip tf.zip

terraform --version
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Your First Infrastructure 

# main.tf — Deploy a web server on AWS

terraform {
  required_providers {
    aws = {
      source  = "hashicorp/aws"
      version = "~> 5.0"
    }
  }
}

provider "aws" {
  region = "us-east-1"
}

# VPC
resource "aws_vpc" "main" {
  cidr_block = "10.0.0.0/16"
  tags = { Name = "my-vpc" }
}

# Subnet
resource "aws_subnet" "public" {
  vpc_id            = aws_vpc.main.id
  cidr_block        = "10.0.1.0/24"
  availability_zone = "us-east-1a"
  map_public_ip_on_launch = true
}

# Security group
resource "aws_security_group" "web" {
  vpc_id = aws_vpc.main.id

  ingress {
    from_port   = 80
    to_port     = 80
    protocol    = "tcp"
    cidr_blocks = ["0.0.0.0/0"]
  }

  ingress {
    from_port   = 443
    to_port     = 443
    protocol    = "tcp"
    cidr_blocks = ["0.0.0.0/0"]
  }

  egress {
    from_port   = 0
    to_port     = 0
    protocol    = "-1"
    cidr_blocks = ["0.0.0.0/0"]
  }
}

# EC2 instance
resource "aws_instance" "web" {
  ami           = "ami-0c02fb55956c7d316"
  instance_type = "t3.micro"
  subnet_id     = aws_subnet.public.id
  vpc_security_group_ids = [aws_security_group.web.id]

  user_data = <<-EOF
    #!/bin/bash
    yum update -y
    yum install -y httpd
    systemctl start httpd
    echo "Hello from Terraform!" > /var/www/html/index.html
  EOF

  tags = { Name = "web-server" }
}

output "public_ip" {
  value = aws_instance.web.public_ip
}
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terraform init    # Download providers
terraform plan    # Preview changes
terraform apply   # Create infrastructure
terraform destroy # Tear everything down
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Variables and Outputs 

# variables.tf
variable "environment" {
  type    = string
  default = "staging"
  validation {
    condition     = contains(["dev", "staging", "production"], var.environment)
    error_message = "Must be dev, staging, or production."
  }
}

variable "instance_count" {
  type    = number
  default = 2
}

variable "allowed_ips" {
  type    = list(string)
  default = ["0.0.0.0/0"]
}

# terraform.tfvars
environment    = "production"
instance_count = 3
allowed_ips    = ["203.0.113.0/24", "198.51.100.0/24"]
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Modules (Reusable Infrastructure) 

# modules/web-app/main.tf
variable "name" { type = string }
variable "instance_type" { default = "t3.micro" }
variable "min_size" { default = 1 }
variable "max_size" { default = 3 }

resource "aws_launch_template" "app" {
  name_prefix   = var.name
  image_id      = data.aws_ami.amazon_linux.id
  instance_type = var.instance_type
}

resource "aws_autoscaling_group" "app" {
  name                = "${var.name}-asg"
  min_size            = var.min_size
  max_size            = var.max_size
  launch_template {
    id      = aws_launch_template.app.id
    version = "$Latest"
  }
}

# Usage
module "api" {
  source        = "./modules/web-app"
  name          = "api"
  instance_type = "t3.small"
  min_size      = 2
  max_size      = 10
}

module "worker" {
  source        = "./modules/web-app"
  name          = "worker"
  instance_type = "t3.medium"
  min_size      = 1
  max_size      = 5
}
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Remote State (Team Collaboration) 

terraform {
  backend "s3" {
    bucket         = "my-terraform-state"
    key            = "production/terraform.tfstate"
    region         = "us-east-1"
    dynamodb_table = "terraform-locks"
    encrypt        = true
  }
}
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Terraform vs Pulumi vs CloudFormation vs CDK

Feature Terraform Pulumi CloudFormation CDK
Language HCL Any (TS, Python, Go) YAML/JSON TypeScript
Multi-cloud Yes (3000+ providers) Yes AWS only AWS only
State Self-managed/Cloud Pulumi Cloud AWS-managed AWS-managed
Plan terraform plan pulumi preview Change sets cdk diff
Community Largest Growing AWS only AWS only
Learning HCL (easy) Your language YAML (verbose) TypeScript
Cost Free (OSS) Free tier Free Free

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