Google Cloud Deployment Manager

Terraform Commands and Concepts

• The graph command can be used to generate the Terraform graph.
• The init command should be used to initialize a Terraform directory.

Terraform Providers

• Third-party vendors can implement external providers outside of HashiCorp.
• A Terraform provider is responsible for understanding API interactions and exposing resources.

Authentication and Files

• Authentication options for accessing or creating resources on AWS using Terraform include access keys, roles, and environment variables.
• Terraform configuration files have a .tf file extension.

HCL and Declarative Format

• HCL stands for HashiCorp Configuration Language in the context of Terraform.
• Terraform relies on HCL for creating declarations.
• Terraform uses HCL for declaring resources in a declarative format.
• HCL is both machine-readable and human-readable.

Provisioning and Tracking

• The apply command can be used with Terraform to create, update, or delete resources.
• Terraform uses a state file to keep track of provisioned resources.

Terraform Features

• Terraform is a tool used to manage infrastructure as code.
• Terraform is cloud-agnostic and supports multiple cloud providers.
• Terraform uses pluggable modules called providers.
• Terraform generates a graph of resources internally.
• Terraform allows reuse of common deployment paradigms, such as load-balanced, auto-scaled instance groups.

Other Tools

• Google Cloud Deployment Manager uses YAML as its markup structure.
• Cloud Deployment Manager allows specifying resources in a declarative format using YAML.