Terraform is as interesting as it sounds. Developed by HashiCorp, Terraform is an open-source infrastructure as code software that utilizes the HashipCorp Configuration Language (HCL). The software also uses JSON alternatively.
To use terraform, users will have to deal with providers by calling data centers or by declaring a resource. Once a user activates terraform using a particular model, the software carries out a CRUD activity that gets the command done based on what the user desires.
To ensure maintenance and reusability, its infrastructure as code can be developed as modules. Since terraform partners with several cloud infrastructure providers such as Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud Platform among others, it has a terraform enterprise option for larger organizations on a paid model.
Best Books on Terraform: Our Top 5 Picks
If you desire to learn more about using Terraform on a personal or professional basis, here are 5 best books on Terraform that you should obtain:
1. Terraform: Up & Running: Writing Infrastructure as Code
This book is designed for system administrators, infrastructure developers, site reliability engineers, and full-stack developers as well as anyone in charge of managing system codes. It is also suitable for professionals in charge of server configuration, backup data, monitoring apps, scaling clusters, and cloud infrastructure.
Whether you are a system developer who can write codes or a system administrator in charge of cloud operations, this book will prove invaluable to you. It covers the progression of Terraform from versions 0.9 to 0.12 and the entire backends, workspaces, and expressions within each generation. It empowers you with the technical skills to create modules and test them for usability and reliability.
Students and career professionals will be up and running with writing infrastructure as code by obtaining this book. They will be able to deploy server clusters, load balancers, and activate databases while also using terraform to manage their infrastructure after digesting this book. It equips users with the ability to achieve zero-downtime deployment using advanced terraform syntax.
Terraform: Up & Running: Writing Infrastructure as Code is the book all terraform enthusiasts need to succeed at creating reusable infrastructure modules among other things.
- Author(s): Yevgeniy Brikman
- Publisher: O’Reilly Media
- Current Edition: Second Edition (October 2019)
- Pages: 368
2. Terraform in Action
Although this book is available in paperback and Kindle format, buying the paperback version makes you eligible for receiving the PDF, Kindle, and ePub formats for free. The publisher is giving away all digital formats for free to customers who purchase the paperback book format – even though you can buy the digital versions differently if you are not interested in the hard book product.
Whatever the case, Terraform in Action is a specialized publication written for people who desire to become experts at designing and managing cloud servers that can be provisioned, shared, changed, tested, and deployed in an instant. This book equips users with the technical expertise to manage codeable applications and cloud infrastructure using infrastructure as code model with ease.
Acquire this book and obtain the ability to create and launch terraform infrastructure that organizations require to scale their operations on a global scale.
- Author(s): Scott Winkler
- Publisher: Manning Publications
- Current Edition: First Edition (July 2021)
- Pages: 408
3. Terraform: Building a Better World
There are 101 things you can learn from a poet, musician, motivational speaker, social activist, and essayist who teaches about making our world a better place. Author Propaganda is not only a famous hip-hop musician and founder of charter schools; he is also an author who wants everyone to play their part in making the world better and livable.
According to him, “we are the world we built. We are the violence and the beauty. We are the hope and destruction. We are keepers and destroyers of culture and planet.” In Terraform: Building a Better World, Propaganda uses the idea of transforming another planet to make it habitable like our Earth. He demonstrates that despite the wickedness and ugliness in the world, people can recreate their universe to be exactly what they want it to be.
In this book, the author also demonstrates that homes, friendships, communities, and even politics can be reshaped to achieve lasting peace, love, progress, and growth. He uses terraform as a basis for spiritual and secular development in all aspects of life. You can take advantage of his storytelling techniques to gain insights into perspectives that make us able to create our own miracles.
Acquire Terraform: Building a Better World and make the world a better place for yourself and the generations to come.
- Author(s): Propaganda
- Publisher: HarperOne
- Current Edition: June 2021
- Pages: 288
4. Getting Started with Terraform: Manage Production Infrastructure as a Code
Written by an IT consultant with specialized expertise on Cloud technologies and DevOps infrastructure, Getting Started with Terraform: Manage Production Infrastructure as a Code is a book constructing, transforming, and combining infrastructure with safe efficiency. This book equips readers with the technical skills to build customized solutions and manage existing large-scale infrastructure.
When you acquire this book, you will understand the fundamentals of accessing providers and resources using infrastructure as code (IaC). It teaches how to set up and implement entire infrastructure using Terraform systems for production results. It gives insight into basic infrastructure templates and managing workflow systems through version control and measurable integration.
You will also learn how to combine several providers into a single template for managing high-end modules. This is the book for you if you are eager to install, configure, and deploy Terraform with the aim of building templates for complex provisioning tasks in the cloud.
- Author(s): Kirill Shirinkin
- Publisher: Packt Publishing
- Current Edition: Second Edition (July 2017)
- Pages: 208
5. Learning Terraform
Available in Kindle format, Learning Terraform explores the simplicity/complexity of setting up cloud technologies just as those used by Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud, and Oracle among others. It teaches the basics of Terraform CLI, cloud technologies, and proprietary enterprise features that make provisioning infrastructure as code easy and executable.
This invaluable resource also offers insights into policy as code, unit testing, and code wrapper in a concise and effective language. At only 72 pages, it provides a comprehensive overview and in-depth treatment of setting up CI/CD pipelines to test and deliver terraform stacks. It also provides complete practices for managing cloud infrastructure in the most seamless manner.
With this resource, you are better equipped to set up, create parameters, and deploy full terraform operations across multiple infrastructures. This book equally contains updated resources for making infrastructure as code (IoC) secure and effective for operational efficiency. With this material, you are sure to be able to construct multi-cloud, fault-tolerant systems that make the execution and management of complex cloud infrastructure seamless.
- Author(s): Rajagopalan R.
- Publisher: N/A
- Current Edition: December 2020
- Pages: 72
Final Thoughts
You can join the league of IT professionals and consultants who possess specialized expertise in building and deploying efficient cloud technologies using Terraform. With these 5 best books on Terraform, you are sure to be able to use infrastructure as code (IoC) models to design, manage, and automate cloud operations with ease.
You will equally be able to provision, share, change, test, and deploy simple or complex infrastructure systems with ruthless efficiency. Acquire these 5 best books on Terraform and replicate the processes behind the cloud technologies deployed by AWS, Google, Oracle, Alibaba Cloud, and others.
