Getting Started

Prerequisites

The SDK comes with a CLI tool that automates some useful processes for development.

Install the CLI tools
```
npm i @lukekaalim/terraform-cli
```
Creating the Example Project

The example project is a default skeleton project that comes with everything installed; It’s easy to extend the skeleton with your own custom code once it’s set up.
Create the project folder and set it to the current working directory
```
mkdir example
cd example
```
Initialize the project
```
node-terraform init
```
You should see something like:

...
added 64 packages from 101 contributors and audited 64 packages in 3.174s
...
Installed terraform-provider-example_0.1.0 to /Users/myname/.terraform.d/plugins/local/example/example/0.1.0/darwin_amd64
...
Terraform has been successfully initialized!
...
Initialized node-terraform project example/example

Congratulations! You should now have a functioning terraform plugin!

Plan and Apply

Lets test it out. By default, the skeleton gave us a provider called “example” and a resource called “example_resource”. It also generated a main.tf file which contains a configuration to create it. They don’t do anything yet, but lets create and destroy one to test that everything works.

Apply the example config
```
terraform apply --auto-approve
```
You should see something like:

empty_resource.my_example_resource: Creating...
empty_resource.my_example_resource: Creation complete after 0s

Apply complete! Resources: 1 added, 0 changed, 0 destroyed.

Teardown the resources you make:
```
terraform destroy --auto-approve
```

Modify manifest

By default your provider is called “example”. You probably want to do something more useful with it, however! To update information about your provider, we’ll need to update the manifest file, and the source code and config.

Update the manifest file to contain your projects proper values.

The manifest file is called: terraform-plugin.config.json.

By default is should contain:

{
  "type": "example",
  "namespace": "example",
  "version": "0.1.0",
  "entry": "plugin.js"
}

Set the “type” to you preferred provider’s name, the namespace to a unique value (your name or your organization’s name).

Update source code to reflect new provider.

In plugin.js, find the example provider:

const exampleProvider = {
  name: 'example',
  attributes: [],
  resources: [exampleResource]
};

and change the “name” property to your new provider’s name.

Re-install the plugin with it’s new name. (You only need to do this if you’ve changed the manifest file)
```
node-terraform install
```

Update the config with your providers new name in main.tf

terraform {
  required_providers {
 example = {                        // << --- change this
   source = "local/example/example" // << --- and this
   version = "0.1.0"
 }
  }
}

Now you’ve got a skeleton, and it should be named properly now. Check out the CatSDK Guide to continue and give a run-through of some of the ways you can use your terraform plugin to manage resources!

Getting Started

Prerequisites

Creating the Example Project

Plan and Apply

Modify manifest