Understand Terraform basics

A DevOps engineer is writing a Terraform configuration to provision an AWS EC2 instance. They want to ensure that the instance is replaced if the AMI ID changes, but not if the instance type changes. Which lifecycle meta-argument should be used?

A team is using Terraform to manage infrastructure across multiple environments (dev, staging, prod). They want to reuse the same root module configuration but with different variable values. Which approach is the most efficient?

A Terraform configuration includes a module from the Terraform Registry. After running `terraform init`, the module is downloaded. However, a subsequent `terraform plan` fails with an error that a required provider is not installed, even though it is declared in the module. What is the most likely cause?

An organization uses Terraform Cloud for remote state management. They have a workspace that uses the CLI-driven run workflow. A developer runs `terraform plan` locally and sees that the plan succeeds. However, when they push the same configuration to the version control system (VCS) connected to the workspace, the plan fails with a state lock error. What is the most likely reason?

Which TWO of the following are valid ways to reference a resource attribute in Terraform?

Refer to the exhibit. A developer runs `terraform apply` and the operation succeeds. Later, they manually terminate the EC2 instance through the AWS console. What will happen when the developer runs `terraform apply` again?

You are a platform engineer at a fintech company. Your team manages a multi-region application on AWS using Terraform. The infrastructure includes VPCs, subnets, EC2 instances, and an Application Load Balancer (ALB). The configuration uses modules from the Terraform Registry and remote state in S3 with DynamoDB locking. Recently, after a colleague ran `terraform apply` in the us-east-1 region, the application experienced downtime because the ALB's target group was accidentally updated to point to instances in us-west-2 instead of us-east-1. The root cause was that the Terraform configuration for the ALB used a variable `target_region` which was hardcoded to us-west-2 in a `terraform.tfvars` file that was not intended for that workspace. Your team wants to prevent such misconfigurations in the future. Which course of action would most effectively reduce the risk of using incorrect variable values across workspaces?

A developer is new to Terraform and wants to understand the core workflow. Which sequence of commands correctly represents the basic Terraform workflow?

Which TWO of the following are true about Terraform state? (Choose two.)

You are a DevOps engineer managing a multi-environment Terraform setup using workspaces. Your team has three workspaces: dev, staging, and prod. All infrastructure is defined in a single root module with environment-specific variable values stored in separate .tfvars files. Recently, a colleague accidentally ran terraform destroy in the prod workspace, which deleted critical production resources. You need to implement a safety mechanism to prevent accidental destruction of production resources in the future. The solution should not require changes to the Terraform provider or backend configuration. Which approach should you take?

Which three of the following are core characteristics of Terraform's execution plan? (Choose three.)

Which of the following are core concepts or behaviors of Terraform's execution model and state management? (Choose four.)

Drag and drop the steps to create and apply a Terraform plan in the correct order.

Drag and drop the steps to set up remote state with Terraform Cloud in the correct order.

Match each Terraform feature to its description.

Match each Terraform provisioner to its typical use case.

A developer runs terraform apply to create an AWS EC2 instance using an AMI sourced from the aws_ami data source with most_recent = true. Immediately after apply completes, the developer runs terraform plan again. The plan shows that Terraform intends to replace the EC2 instance. What is the most likely cause?

A team is using Terraform to manage infrastructure across multiple environments (dev, test, prod). They want to reuse the same configuration but vary resource configurations like instance size and number of instances. Which Terraform feature should they use?

A company has a monolithic Terraform configuration that manages all infrastructure. As the infrastructure grows, plan and apply times become very long. They want to break the configuration into smaller, independent units to improve performance and reduce blast radius. Which approach should they take?

A developer is new to Terraform and wants to understand the purpose of the terraform init command. Which statement correctly describes its primary function?

A developer accidentally deletes the local terraform.tfstate file. The backend is configured to store state remotely in an S3 bucket. What is the effect on Terraform operations?

A team uses Terraform with a remote backend that stores state in Azure Storage. A developer runs terraform apply and receives an error: 'Error refreshing state: state data in Azure Blob does not have expected content.' What is the most likely cause?

A developer wants to use the output of one Terraform configuration as input to another. Which Terraform feature should they use?

A Terraform configuration uses a module from the Terraform Registry. The module's documentation states it requires Terraform version >= 0.14. The team is using Terraform 0.12. What should the developer do to use this module?

A developer runs terraform plan and sees a large number of resources will be destroyed. They suspect the state file is corrupted. They have a recent backup of the state file. Which command can help recover the previous state from the backup?

Which two of the following are correct statements about Terraform providers?

Which three of the following are valid ways to pass variable values to a Terraform configuration?

Which three of the following are true regarding Terraform state?

Refer to the exhibit. What will happen when terraform plan is run?

Refer to the exhibit. What does this output indicate?

Refer to the exhibit. What is the most likely cause of this error?

A team uses Terraform to manage AWS resources. They want to ensure that a security group is created before an EC2 instance that references it. What is the best practice?

What file extension is commonly used for Terraform configuration files?

A developer runs `terraform apply` and gets the error: 'Error: No configuration files'. What is the most likely cause?

A company wants to use Terraform to create Azure resources. They have written a configuration file but when they run `terraform init`, they get a warning about an 'incomplete lock file'. What should they do first?

In Terraform, which command is used to format configuration files according to the HCL canonical style?

A Terraform configuration uses `count` to create multiple EC2 instances. After adding a new variable for instance type, the user runs `terraform plan` and sees that all instances are marked for recreation. What is the most likely cause?

An organization uses Terraform with multiple workspaces to manage different environments (dev, staging, prod). They want to ensure that sensitive variables for prod are not exposed in the plan output. What should they do?

Which of the following commands creates an execution plan that shows what resources will be created, updated, or destroyed?

A team manages infrastructure with Terraform. They recently updated the provider version in the configuration from 2.0 to 3.0. After running `terraform init`, they get errors that some resource arguments are no longer valid. What is the best approach to resolve this?

Which TWO of the following are valid variable types in Terraform? (Choose two.)

Which TWO of the following are valid ways to pass variable values to a Terraform configuration? (Choose two.)

Which THREE of the following are characteristics of Terraform state? (Choose three.)

Your team uses Terraform to manage a multi-region AWS deployment consisting of over 500 resources. The state file is stored in an S3 backend with DynamoDB locking. Recently, one of your colleagues accidentally deleted the state file from S3 while trying to clean up old backups. Fortunately, you have a backup from two days ago. However, after restoring the backup, you notice that several recent changes, including two new EC2 instances and a security group, are missing from the state. The actual resources still exist in AWS. You need to bring the state back in sync with the real-world infrastructure without recreating these resources. What should you do?

A team is new to Terraform and wants to manage their cloud infrastructure. They have written configuration files but have not yet run any commands. What is the correct sequence of initial steps to deploy their infrastructure?

A DevOps engineer is working on a Terraform project that manages resources across multiple AWS accounts. To reduce duplication and ensure consistency, they want to define common configurations like provider settings and variable definitions in a separate location that can be reused across root modules. What feature should they use?

A company is using Terraform to manage secrets in AWS Secrets Manager. They want to ensure that sensitive values are not exposed in logs, the console, or plan output. Which two practices should they implement? (Choose two.)

A junior engineer cloned a Terraform repository from GitHub and ran terraform init inside the project directory. The command downloaded the required provider plugins successfully. Next, they ran terraform plan and received the following error: 'Error: No configuration files found in the current directory.' The engineer checked and confirmed that the main.tf file exists in the current directory. What is the most likely cause of this error?

An organization uses Terraform Cloud to manage their infrastructure. They have a workspace configured with a VCS-backed workflow connected to their GitHub repository. They recently added a new AWS provider version requirement in their configuration. After committing and pushing the change, they notice that the plan in Terraform Cloud fails with an error indicating that the provider version is not found. However, the engineer can run the same configuration locally with terraform init and plan successfully. What is the most likely reason for the failure in Terraform Cloud?

A platform team manages a large Terraform codebase with hundreds of resources across multiple environments (dev, staging, prod). They use terraform workspaces to manage environment-specific state files. Recently, an engineer made changes to the production workspace but forgot to switch from the dev workspace before applying. The apply was successful, but now the production resources are in an inconsistent state. The team wants to recover the production state to match the actual infrastructure. The previous state file for production was backed up in an S3 bucket before the accidental apply. What is the best course of action?

Which TWO of the following statements about Terraform state are correct? (Choose two.)

Refer to the exhibit. Which change to the configuration would prevent this error in the future?

A company uses Terraform to manage infrastructure across dev, staging, and production environments. They use Terraform workspaces to separate state files. The backend is configured with an S3 bucket for state storage and a DynamoDB table for state locking. Recently, the team has grown from 2 to 10 developers, and they frequently encounter the error: 'Error acquiring the state lock' when running terraform apply in quick succession. The error message includes: 'Lock Info: ID: ... Operation: Apply. Who: user@company.com. Version: 1.0.0. Created: ...' The error occurs intermittently, especially during peak deployment times. The DynamoDB table is configured with 5 read and 5 write capacity units. The team's current workflow involves multiple developers running apply on different workspaces simultaneously. Which course of action should the team take to minimize state locking errors?

Refer to the exhibit. A user runs terraform init and receives an error about state data content. The state file in S3 has not been manually modified. What is the most likely cause?

Refer to the exhibit. A user applies this configuration and then runs 'terraform state list'. Which resource addresses would appear in the output?

Refer to the exhibit. An engineer runs 'terraform plan' and receives an error: 'Error refreshing state: state data in S3 does not have the expected content.' The state file exists and is not corrupted. What is the most likely cause?

Refer to the exhibit. A user runs 'terraform plan' and sees this output. However, when they run 'terraform apply', they get an error: 'Error creating EC2 instance: UnauthorizedOperation: You are not authorized to perform this operation.' The user's IAM permissions allow ec2:RunInstances. What is the most likely missing permission?

Refer to the exhibit. A user applies this configuration. They then run 'terraform destroy' but the destroy fails with an error: 'Error deleting load balancer: DependencyViolation: The load balancer 'arn:aws:elasticloadbalancing:...' cannot be deleted because it is currently associated with another resource.' The user has not made any changes to the resources. What is the most likely cause?