Day 71: Let's Prepare for some interview questions of Terraform

Table of Contents:

1 Terraform Interview Questions.

2 Explain the questions of Terraform.

Q1 What is Terraform and how it is different from other Iaac Tools?

Terraform is an infrastructure as code (IAC) tool developed by Hashicorp. It allows users to define and provision infrastructure resources in a declarative manner. WIth Terraform, Infrastructure is trated as code,enabling its creation,management and versioning.

Here are a few ways in which Terraform differs from other IaaC tools:

A) A Terraform is cloud-agnostic and supports multiple cloud providers,including Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud Platform (GCP) and more.

B) Terraform uses a declarative approach where you define the desired state of your infrastructure in configuration files. Terraform then determines the changes required to reach that desired state and applies them ensuring that the actual infrastructure matches the defined configurations.

C) Terraform maintains a state file that keeps track of the resources provisioned by Terraform. This state file helps Terraform understand the current state of your infrastructure and allows is to plan and apply only the necessary changes. The state file can be stored remotely allowing collaboration and shared state management.

Q2 How do you call a main.tf module?

In terraform themain.tfmodule is typically called by using the module block in another configuration file. To call themain.tfmodule you need to follow these steps:

A) Create a new Terraform configuration file, lets saymain.tfor any other name of your choice.

B) In the new configuration file defines a module block and specify a name for the module. For Example:

 module "example" {
      source = "./path/to/main.tf"
    }

Here example is the name given to the module. The source parameters specifies the path to the directory containing themain.tfmodule. Adjust the "/path/tomain.tfvalue according to the actual path of yourmain.tfmodule.

Save the configuration file

From the command line navigate to the directory where the new configuration file is located.

Run the terraform Commands to initialize plan and apply the configuration for Example:

 terraform init
    terraform plan
    terraform apply

By calling themain.tfmodule using the module block in another configuration file Terraform will load and execute themain.tfmodule incorporating its resource and configurations into the overall infrastructure provisioning process.

Q3 How do you manage sensitive data in Terraform,such as API keys or passwords?

Managing Sensitive data in Terraform such as API keys or passwords,requires taking precautions to ensure their security and avoid exposing them in plaintext.Hereare some recommended approaches.

1) Use Environment variables: Store sensitive data as environment variables on the system running Terraform. you can reference these variables in your terraform configurations files using the ${var.VARIABLE_NAME} syntax. This allows you to keep the sensitive information separate from the Terraform code and heels prevent accident exposure.

2) Utilise Terraform input Variables: Declare input variables in your terraform configuration to accept sensitive data during runtime. These variables can be prompted for interactively or passed through command-line options. Ensure that you mark such sensitive input variables as sensitive so that their values are not displayed in the output or logged.

3) Implement Access Controls:- Limit access to terraform configurations and sensitive data to authorized users. Apply the principle of least privilege granting only the necessary permissions required to execute terraform commands and access sensitive resources.

Q4 You are working on a Terraform project that needs to provision an S3 bucket and a user read and write access to the bucket. What resources would you use to accomplish this and how would you configure them.

To provision an S3 bucket and a user with read and write access to that bucket using terraform, you would utilise the following resources.

aws_s3_bucket: This resource is used to create the S3 bucket.

aws_iam_user: The resource is used to create an IAM user.

aws_iam_access_key and aws_iam_user_policy: The resource are used to create an access key for the IAM user and attach a policy granting read and write access to the S3 bucket.

 resource "aws_s3_bucket" "example_bucket" {
   bucket = "your-bucket-name"
   acl    = "private"
 }
 resource "aws_iam_user" "example_user" {
   name = "your-username"
 }
 resource "aws_iam_access_key" "example_access_key" {
   user = aws_iam_user.example_user.name
 }

 resource "aws_iam_user_policy" "example_user_policy" {
   name   = "your-policy-name"
   user   = aws_iam_user.example_user.name
   policy = <<EOF
 {
   "Version": "2012-10-17",
   "Statement": [
     {
       "Sid": "AllowS3Access",
       "Effect": "Allow",
       "Action": [
         "s3:GetObject",
         "s3:PutObject"
       ],
       "Resource": "arn:aws:s3:::your-bucket-name/*"
     }
   ]
 }
 EOF
 }

Q5 Who maintain Terraform Providers?

Terraform providers are maintained by the respective cloud providers open source communities or organisations responsible for the infrastructure or services being targeted. Hashicorp the company behind Terraform provides and maintains a set at official providers known as "Hashicorp" maintained providers. These official providers cover a wide range of cloud platforms,including AWS,Azure, Google Cloud and more.

However it's important to note many cloud providers also maintain and release their own Terraform providers. These providers are typically developed and maintained by the cloud providers engineering teams to ensure to compatibility and support for their services in Terraform.

Q6 How can we export data from the one module to another?

To export data from one module to another in Terraform:

1 Exporting Data: In the module containing the desired data, define an output variable in theoutputs.tffile.

 output "example_variable" {
      value = "some_value"
    }

2 Importing Data: In the module where you want to import the exported data, reference it using the module's namespaces and the variable name.

 module "module1" {
      source = "./module1"
    }

    module "module2" {
      source = "./module2"

      example_variable = module.module1.example_variable
    }

By using output variables and referencing them in the consuming module, you can easily export and import data between Terraform modules.

Thank you for reading!! Hope you find this helpful.

#day71challenge#90daysofdevops

Always open to suggestions..!!

~ Manoj Bhamidipati 🙂