Infrastructure as Code and Observability

Terraform Patterns

Module Structure

main.tf (resource definitions) | variables.tf (input declarations) | outputs.tf (output declarations) | versions.tf (provider/terraform version constraints) | README.md (module docs).

State Management

Remote backend: S3/GCS/Azure Blob with state locking. State locking: DynamoDB/Cloud Storage/Azure Blob lease. Workspace strategy: one workspace per environment (dev/staging/prod).

Security

Never commit secrets -- use secret managers | Encrypt state at rest | Use OIDC for CI/CD auth | Least privilege IAM roles.

IaC Principles (Kief Morris)

Reproducibility (same input, same output) | Idempotency (safe to run multiple times) | Immutability (replace, do not modify) | Version control (track all changes).