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Terraform Learning & Architect's Reference

A working notebook and architectural reference built against real local roots, a GCP project, and a five-repo GKE/Helm/Consul sandbox.

Start at the Architect's Reference — 11 sequential, zero-noise articles combining core theory, local cheatsheets (01-basics/), and GCP production implementations (02-gcp-terraform/ & Sandbox) with a focus on interview-worthy mechanics and architectural trade-offs.

Section What It Contains Code Directories
Architect's Reference 11 sequential articles merging Theory + Local Basics + GCP labs + Cheatsheet 01-basics/, 02-gcp-terraform/
GCP Visual Labs 4 GCP networking & core-resource labs with sliced SVG diagrams & interactive HTML inspectors 02-gcp-terraform/
Acme Sandbox Five interdependent Terraform roots, Consul contracts, GKE, Cloud SQL, Helm, Workload Identity ../acme-sampleapp-multirepo
Quiz 66 scenario questions across 6 topics, covering all reference articles and real debugging incidents —

Sequential Reference Articles

# Article Key Topics
1 Execution Model, Providers & Auth 3-way diff, Core vs Provider, required_providers vs provider {}, ADC precedence, lock files, aliasing
2 Resources, State Mechanics & Backends State ledger purpose, non-atomic apply, clobber vs 409, GCS backend chicken-and-egg, plan read-access security
3 Resource Identity, Change & Lifecycle Address identity, moved blocks, in-place vs Force-New, prevent_destroy, ignore_changes, create_before_destroy
4 Dependencies & the Execution Graph Implicit reference edges, when depends_on is required vs redundant, reverse destroy order, plan-time unknowns
5 Variables, Precedence, Locals & Sensitive Data Exact variable precedence order, type constraints, validation, why sensitive = true is not encryption, volatile functions
6 Expressions, Conditionals & Guard Propagation Ternaries, for comprehensions, try/one/coalesce, count = 0 empty-list trap, downstream guard propagation
7 Repetition: count, for_each & dynamic Index-shift destruction vs keyed stability, for_each over modules, dynamic nested blocks, plan-time key rule
8 Data Sources, Outputs & Module Design Live data reads vs resource, google_client_config token expiry, -raw vs -json, module boundaries, archive_file vs local-exec
9 State Surgery, Drift, Import & Workspaces state mv/rm/import, import-vs-recreate decision framework, import diff trap, workspace isolation caveats
10 Production Architecture: Multi-Repo, GKE, Networking & CI/CD Root blast radius, Consul KV vs terraform_remote_state, VPC/IAP/Peering, GKE transient node pool & Workload Identity, GitOps PR security
11 Master HCL, CLI & Glossary Cheatsheet Annotated all-in-one HCL template, complete CLI lookup table, and 1-line architectural glossary

Running Docs & Graphs Locally

pip install -r requirements.txt
mkdocs serve

# Or without modifying your local Python environment:
uvx --with mkdocs-material mkdocs serve

# Render a Terraform dependency graph (requires Graphviz):
terraform graph | dot -Tsvg > graph.svg