A Concourse resource that allows jobs to modify IaaS resources via Terraform.
Useful for creating a pool of reproducible environments. No more snowflakes!
See DEVELOPMENT if you're interested in submitting a PR 👍

Source Configuration
Important!: The source.storage field has been replaced by source.backend_type and source.backend_config to leverage the built-in Terraform backends. If you currently use source.storage in your pipeline, follow the instructions in the Backend Migration section to ensure your state files are not lost.
-
backend_type: Required. The name of the Terraform backend the resource will use to store statefiles, e.g. s3 or consul.
Note: The 'local' backend type is not supported, Concourse requires that state is persisted outside the container
-
backend_config: Required. A map of key-value configuration options specific to your choosen backend, e.g. S3 options.
-
env_name: Optional. Name of the environment to manage, e.g. staging. A Terraform workspace will be created with this name. See Single vs Pool section below for more options.
-
delete_on_failure: Optional. Default false. If true, the resource will run terraform destroy if terraform apply returns an error.
-
vars: Optional. A collection of Terraform input variables.
These are typically used to specify credentials or override default module values.
See Terraform Input Variables for more details.
-
env: Optional. Similar to vars, this collection of key-value pairs can be used to pass environment variables to Terraform, e.g. "AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID".
-
private_key: Optional. An SSH key used to fetch modules, e.g. private GitHub repos.
Source Example
resource_types:
- name: terraform
type: docker-image
source:
repository: ljfranklin/terraform-resource
tag: latest
resources:
- name: terraform
type: terraform
source:
env_name: staging
backend_type: s3
backend_config:
bucket: mybucket
key: mydir/terraform.tfstate
region: us-east-1
access_key: {{storage_access_key}}
secret_key: {{storage_secret_key}}
vars:
tag_name: concourse
env:
AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID: {{environment_access_key}}
AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY: {{environment_secret_key}}
The above example uses AWS S3 to store Terraform state files. All backend_config options documented here are forwarded straight to Terraform.
Terraform also supports many other state file backends, for example Google Cloud Storage (GCS):
resources:
- name: terraform
type: terraform
source:
backend_type: gcs
backend_config:
bucket: mybucket
prefix: mydir
region: us-central1
credentials: {{gcp_credentials_json}}
...
Image Variants
- Latest stable release of resource:
ljfranklin/terraform-resource:latest.
- Specific versions of Terraform, e.g.
ljfranklin/terraform-resource:0.7.7.
- RC builds from Terraform pre-releases:
ljfranklin/terraform-resource:rc.
- Nightly builds from Terraform
master branch: ljfranklin/terraform-resource:nightly.
See Dockerhub for a list of all available tags.
If you'd like to build your own image from a specific Terraform branch, configure a pipeline with build-image-pipeline.yml.
Behavior
This resource should usually be used with the put action rather than a get.
This ensures the output always reflects the current state of the IaaS and allows management of multiple environments as shown below.
A get step outputs the same metadata file format shown below for put.
Get Parameters
Note: In Concourse, a put is always followed by an implicit get. To pass get params via put, use put.get_params.
-
output_statefile: Optional. Default false If true, the resource writes the Terraform statefile to a file named terraform.tfstate.Warning: Ensure any changes to this statefile are persisted back to the resource's storage bucket. Another warning: Some statefiles contain unencrypted secrets, be careful not to expose these in your build logs.
-
output_planfile: Optional. Default false If true a file named plan.json with the JSON representation of the Terraform binary plan file will be created.
-
output_module Optional. Write only the outputs from the given module name to the metadata file.
Put Parameters
-
terraform_source: Required. The relative path of the directory containing your Terraform configuration files.
For example: if your .tf files are stored in a git repo called prod-config under a directory terraform-configs, you could do a get: prod-config in your pipeline with terraform_source: prod-config/terraform-configs/ as the source.
-
env_name: Optional, see Note. The name of the environment to create or modify. A Terraform workspace will be created with this name. Multiple environments can be managed with a single resource.
-
generate_random_name: Optional, see Note. Default false Generates a random env_name (e.g. "coffee-bee"). See Single vs Pool section below.
-
env_name_file: Optional, see Note. Reads the env_name from a specified file path. Useful for destroying environments from a lock file.
Note: You must specify one of the following options: source.env_name, put.params.env_name, put.params.generate_random_name, or env_name_file
-
delete_on_failure: Optional. Default false. See description under source.delete_on_failure.
-
vars: Optional. A collection of Terraform input variables. See description under source.vars.
-
var_files: Optional. A list of files containing Terraform input variables. These files can be in YAML, JSON, or HCL (filename must end in .tfvars) format.
Terraform variables will be merged from the following locations in increasing order of precedence: source.vars, put.params.vars, and put.params.var_files. Finally, env_name is automatically passed as an input var.
-
env: Optional. A key-value collection of environment variables to pass to Terraform. See description under source.env.
-
private_key: Optional. An SSH key used to fetch modules, e.g. private GitHub repos.
-
plan_only: Optional. Default false This boolean will allow Terraform to create a plan file and store it the configured backend. Useful for manually reviewing a plan prior to applying. See Plan and Apply Example. Warning: Plan files contain unencrypted credentials like AWS Secret Keys, only store these files in a private bucket.
-
plan_run: Optional. Default false This boolean will allow Terraform to execute the plan file stored on the configured backend, then delete it.
-
import_files: Optional. A list of files containing existing resources to import into the state file. The files can be in YAML or JSON format, containing key-value pairs like aws_instance.bar: i-abcd1234.
-
override_files: Optional. A list of files to copy into the terraform_source directory. Override files must follow conventions outlined here such as file names ending in _override.tf.
-
module_override_files: Optional. A list of maps to copy override files to specific destination directories. Override files must follow conventions outlined here such as file names ending in _override.tf.
The source file is specified with src and the destination directory with dst.
-
action: Optional. When set to destroy, the resource will run terraform destroy against the given statefile.
Note: You must also set put.get_params.action to destroy to ensure the task succeeds. This is a temporary workaround until Concourse adds support for delete as a first-class operation. See this issue for more details.
-
plugin_dir: Optional. The path (relative to your terraform_source) of the directory containing plugin binaries. This overrides the default plugin directory and Terraform will not automatically fetch built-in plugins if this option is used. To preserve the automatic fetching of plugins, omit plugin_dir and place third-party plugins in ${terraform_source}/terraform.d/plugins. See https://www.terraform.io/docs/configuration/providers.html#third-party-plugins for more information.
Put Example
Every put action creates name and metadata files as an output containing the env_name and Terraform Outputs in JSON format.
jobs:
- name: update-infrastructure
plan:
- get: project-git-repo
- put: terraform
params:
env_name: e2e
terraform_source: project-git-repo/terraform
- task: show-outputs
config:
platform: linux
inputs:
- name: terraform
run:
path: /bin/sh
args:
- -c
- |
echo "name: $(cat terraform/name)"
echo "metadata: $(cat terraform/metadata)"
The preceding job would show a file similar to the following:
name: e2e
metadata: { "vpc_id": "vpc-123456", "vpc_tag_name": "concourse" }
Plan and apply example
jobs:
- name: terraform-plan
plan:
- get: project-git-repo
- put: terraform
params:
env_name: staging
terraform_source: project-git-repo/terraform
plan_only: true
vars:
subnet_cidr: 10.0.1.0/24
- name: terraform-apply
plan:
- get: project-git-repo
trigger: false
passed: [terraform-plan]
- get: terraform
trigger: false
passed: [terraform-plan]
- put: terraform
params:
env_name: staging
terraform_source: project-git-repo/terraform
plan_run: true
Managing a single environment vs a pool of environments
This resource can be used to manage a single environment or a pool of many environments.
Single Environment
To use this resource to manage a single environment, set source.env_name or put.params.env_name to a fixed name like staging or production as shown in the previous put example.
Each put will update the IaaS resources and state file for that environment.
Pool of Environments
To manage a pool of many environments, you can use this resource in combination with the pool-resource.
This allows you to create a pool of identical environments that can be claimed and released by CI jobs and humans.
Setting put.params.generate_random_name: true will create a random, unique env_name like "coffee-bee" for each environment, and
the pool-resource will persist the name and metadata for these environments in a private git repo.
jobs:
- name: create-env-and-lock
plan:
# apply the terraform template with a random env_name
- get: project-git-repo
- put: terraform
params:
terraform_source: project-git-repo/terraform
generate_random_name: true
delete_on_failure: true
vars:
subnet_cidr: 10.0.1.0/24
# create a new pool-resource lock containing the terraform output
- put: locks
params:
add: terraform/
- name: claim-env-and-test
plan:
# claim a random env lock
- put: locks
params:
acquire: true
# the locks dir will contain `name` and `metadata` files described above
- task: run-tests-against-env
file: test.yml
input_mapping:
env: locks/
- name: destroy-env-and-lock
plan:
- get: project-git-repo
# acquire a lock
- put: locks
params:
acquire: true
# destroy the IaaS resources
- put: terraform
params:
terraform_source: project-git-repo/terraform
env_name_file: locks/name
action: destroy
get_params:
action: destroy
# destroy the lock
- put: locks
params:
remove: locks/
Backend Migration
Previous versions of this resource required statefiles to be stored in an S3-compatible blobstore using the source.storage field.
The latest version of this resource instead uses the build-in Terraform Backends to support many other statefile storage options in addition to S3.
If you have an existing pipeline that uses source.storage, your statefiles will need to be migrated into the new backend directory structure using the following steps:
- Rename
source.storage to source.migrated_from_storage in your pipeline config. All fields within source.storage should remain unchanged, only the top-level key should be renamed.
- Add
source.backend_type and source.backend_config fields as described under Source Configuration.
- Update your pipeline:
fly set-pipeline.
- The next time your pipeline performs a
put to the Terraform resource:
- The resource will copy the statefile for the modified environment into the new directory structure.
- The resource will rename the old statefile in S3 to
$ENV_NAME.migrated.
- Once all statefiles have been migrated and everything is working as expected, you may:
- Remove the old
.migrated statefiles.
- Remove the
source.migrated_from_storage from your pipeline config.
Breaking Change: The backend mode drops support for feeding Terraform outputs back in as input vars to subsequent puts. This "feature" causes suprising errors if inputs and outputs have the same name but different types and the implementation was significantly more complicated with the new migrated_from_storage flow.
Legacy storage configuration
-
migrated_from_storage.bucket: Required. The S3 bucket used to store the state files.
-
migrated_from_storage.bucket_path: Required. The S3 path used to store state files, e.g. mydir/.
-
migrated_from_storage.access_key_id: Required. The AWS access key used to access the bucket.
-
migrated_from_storage.secret_access_key: Required. The AWS secret key used to access the bucket.
-
migrated_from_storage.region_name: Optional. The AWS region where the bucket is located.
-
migrated_from_storage.server_side_encryption: Optional. An encryption algorithm to use when storing objects in S3, e.g. "AES256".
-
migrated_from_storage.sse_kms_key_id Optional. The ID of the AWS KMS master encryption key used for the object.
-
migrated_from_storage.endpoint: Optional. The endpoint for an s3-compatible blobstore (e.g. Ceph).
Note: By default, the resource will use S3 signing version v2 if an endpoint is specified as many non-S3 blobstores do not support v4.
Opt into v4 signing by setting migrated_from_storage.use_signing_v4: true.
Migration Example
resources:
- name: terraform
type: terraform
source:
backend_type: s3
backend_config:
bucket: mybucket
key: mydir/terraform.tfstate
region: us-east-1
access_key: {{storage_access_key}}
secret_key: {{storage_secret_key}}
migrated_from_storage:
bucket: mybucket
bucket_path: mydir/
region: us-east-1
access_key_id: {{storage_access_key}}
secret_access_key: {{storage_secret_key}}
vars:
tag_name: concourse
env:
AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID: {{environment_access_key}}
AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY: {{environment_secret_key}}