Infrastructure as Code (IaC): Part 4 of the blog series
CI/CD integration with Terraform for Azure
In the fourth and final part of our blog series, we take a closer look at how you can integrate Continuous Integration and Continuous Deployment (CI/CD) pipelines for the provisioning of your Azure infrastructure with Terraform. We will show you how you can manage your infrastructure more efficiently and reliably through automation.
Why CI/CD with Terraform?
The combination of CI/CD pipelines with Terraform offers enormous advantages. You can implement your infrastructure changes not only faster, but also more consistently. Errors are minimized and the deployment process is accelerated. You gain more time for development and have to deal less with manual tasks.
How does it work?
- Automation of your infrastructure: With CI/CD pipelines, you can ensure that every change to your infrastructure is automatically tested, approved and deployed. This means that your infrastructure is always up to date and sources of error are significantly reduced. This is because every manual intervention by a developer costs time, creates dependencies and therefore increases costs in the long term while decreasing efficiency.
- Easy setup with Azure DevOps: Azure DevOps provides everything you need to centrally manage and automatically deploy your Terraform configurations. This allows you to ensure that your infrastructure changes run smoothly and efficiently. Azure DevOps is also natively integrated with other Azure services such as Microsoft Entra ID or Defender for Cloud.
Challenges and solutions:
- Management of the Terraform state file: A common challenge with CI/CD integration is managing the Terraform statefile, especially when multiple teams are working on it simultaneously. As a refresher: the statefile represents your Azure environment currently managed with Terraform. With Azure storage accounts as remote backends, you can overcome this challenge and ensure that all teams are always working with the latest data.
- Security of your data: Protect sensitive data such as API keys and access data by using secure methods such as Azure Key Vault. This keeps your data secure even in automated processes. DevOps pipelines can access a KeyVault and the secrets it contains during their runtime. This allows secure use of secrets and access.
Best practices for your successful CI/CD workflow?
- Secure storage: Use remote backends to store your Terraform state files.
- Automated tests: Integrate automated tests to ensure that everything works as planned.
- Easy maintenance: Structure your pipelines modularly to simplify troubleshooting and maintenance.
Our conclusion
The integration of CI/CD pipelines with Terraform in Azure is a crucial step in managing your cloud infrastructure efficiently and securely. By automating deployment and using Azure DevOps, for example, you can implement changes consistently and error-free. Challenges such as managing the Terraform state file and protecting sensitive data are overcome using proven methods such as remote backends and Azure Key Vault.
This leads to a significant increase in the efficiency and flexibility of your IT processes, allowing you to react more quickly to changes and shorten your development cycles. A well-integrated CI/CD solution therefore forms the foundation for a future-proof, scalable and high-performance IT infrastructure.
If you would like to learn more about how you can implement these processes in your company, please contact us. Let's take your cloud strategy to the next level together.
Blog post author
Mirko is a Cloud Solutions Architect at celver and supports customers both in their transition to the cloud and in the optimization of existing environments. His job is to understand the needs and requirements of customers, translate these into architectural concepts and implement them. He mainly uses the Terraform framework to ensure a consistent and professional platform.
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