CLZ-100 - Terraform Foundations

Service or workflow illustration. The lesson defines the exact resource settings. Open at full size.

Goal

Learn configuration, variables, locals, outputs, formatting, validation, and plan review without Azure credentials or Azure resources.

Arrows show the learning sequence, not service traffic. Local only. Open at full size.

Prerequisites

• Terraform is available on PATH; use CLZ-090 if it is not.
• No Azure login or subscription is required.

Architecture

Lesson-specific teaching diagram. Read the arrow legend and the accompanying architecture explanation. Local only. On narrow screens, scroll the diagram horizontally. Open at full size.

The configuration combines three harmless input values into a preview of the naming and tagging model used later. Terraform evaluates expressions and outputs locally; it declares no provider, backend, data source, or resource.

Resources And Cost

Relative cost: None. Terraform performs local evaluation only.

Component	Purpose and principal cost driver
Terraform configuration preview	Derived resource-group name, location, and standard tags; it is output data, not an Azure object.
Local plan file	Optional tfplan used to practice plan inspection.

Inputs

Input	Required substitution or decision
environment	Use dev, test, or prod and observe the derived name.
location	A string used only in the preview; no regional API is called.
name_prefix	A short naming prefix used to construct the preview.

Keep real subscription IDs, CIDRs, and secrets in untracked terraform.tfvars or environment variables.

Deploy

Review the plan and lesson-specific gates before deliberate execution. Local-only and read-only lessons create no Azure resources. Open at full size.

Run from the repository root in PowerShell 7:

Set-Location CLZ-100-foundations
terraform init -backend=false -lockfile=readonly
terraform fmt -check
terraform validate
terraform plan -out tfplan
terraform show tfplan

Do not run az login; this lesson is intentionally credential-free.

Validate

terraform providers
$previewPlan = terraform show -json tfplan | ConvertFrom-Json
$previewPlan.output_changes.configuration_preview.after
@($previewPlan.resource_changes).Where({ $null -ne $_ }).Count

Expected result:

• terraform providers lists no Azure provider requirement.
• configuration_preview shows the expected prefix, location, and four standard tags.
• The resource-change count is zero because no resource is declared. The JSON property may be absent.

terraform output reads outputs already stored in state. For this plan-only exercise, inspect the proposed outputs in the saved plan instead.

Troubleshooting

Gather evidence, repair the cause, and rerun verification. Open at full size.

Symptom	Resolution
Terraform tries to use Azure	Confirm you are in CLZ-100-foundations and that no untracked .tf files were copied into it.
Initialization requests a backend	Remove an untracked backend override and rerun with -backend=false.
The preview name is unexpected	Compare terraform.tfvars with the three inputs documented above.

Cleanup

Use the lesson state and cleanup instructions. Preserve remote-state dependencies until consumers are removed. Open at full size.

Remove-Item tfplan -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue
terraform state list

terraform state list returns no managed resources. No Azure destroy is needed.

Production Delta

• Adopt an agreed naming/tagging standard and enforce it with policy before creating shared infrastructure.
• Use reviewed modules and remote state only after the underlying Terraform concepts are understood.

Exercises

1. Change environment to test and predict the output before replanning.
2. Use terraform console to evaluate local.tags and local.prefix.

Navigation

← CLZ-090 - Optional Windows Contributor Workstation Setup | Curriculum | CLZ-110 - Azure CLI and Subscription Readiness →