'How to give a .tf file as input in Terraform Apply command?

I'm a beginner in Terraform.

I have a directory which contains 2 .tf files.

Now I want to run Terraform Apply on a selected .tf file & neglect the other one.

Can I do that? If yes, how? If no, why & what is the best practice?

Solution 1:^[1]

You can use the terraform -target flag. Or You can have multiple terraform modules in a separate directory. And then you can terraform apply there. As an example, assume you have 3 .tf files separately. But you need to run more than just one of them at the same time. If you also, need to run them more often it's better to have a terraform module.

terraform
    |--frontend
    |  ???main.tf
    |--backend-1
    |  ???main.tf
    |--backend-2
    |  ???main.tf
    |--modules-1
    |  ???module.tf

Inside the module.tf you can define which files you need to apply.

module "frontend" {
  source = "terraform/frontend"
}

module "backend-1" {
  source = "terraform/backend-1"
}

Then issue terraform apply staying at the module directory. And it will automatically import instances inside those paths and apply it.

Solution 2:^[2]

Putting each terraform config file into separate directory did the job correctly. So here, is my structure

??? aws
?   ??? aws_terraform.tf
??? trash
?   ??? main.tf

All you have to do:

enter each folder
terraform init && terraform plan && terraform apply
enter 'yes' to confirm terraform apply

PS: '-target' key didn't help me out.

Solution 3:^[3]

Either use a --target option to specify module to run by using below command

terraform apply -target=module.<module_name>

Or another workaround is rename other terraform files with *.tf.disable extension to skip it by loading via Terraform. Currently it's Code loading *.tf files

Solution 4:^[4]

No, unfortunately, Terraform doesn't have the feature to apply a selected .tf file. Terraform applies all .tf files in the same directory.

But you can apply the selected code with comment out and uncomment. For example, you have 2 .tf files "1st.tf" and "2nd.tf" in the same directory to create the resources for GCP(Google Cloud Platform):

Then, "1st.tf" has this code below:

provider "google" {
  credentials = file("myCredentials.json")
  project     = "myproject-113738"
  region      = "asia-northeast1"
}

resource "google_project_service" "project" {
  service = "iam.googleapis.com"
  disable_dependent_services = true
}

And "2nd.tf" has this code below:

resource "google_service_account" "service_account_1" {
  display_name = "Service Account 1"
  account_id   = "service-account-1"
}

resource "google_service_account" "service_account_2" {
  display_name = "Service Account 2"
  account_id   = "service-account-2"
}

Now, first, you want to only apply the code in "1st.tf" so you need to comment out the code in "2nd.tf":

1st.tf:

provider "google" {
  credentials = file("myCredentials.json")
  project     = "myproject-113738"
  region      = "asia-northeast1"
}

resource "google_project_service" "project" {
  service = "iam.googleapis.com"
  disable_dependent_services = true
}

2nd.tf (Comment Out):

# resource "google_service_account" "service_account_1" {
#   display_name = "Service Account 1"
#   account_id   = "service-account-1"
# }

# resource "google_service_account" "service_account_2" {
#   display_name = "Service Account 2"
#   account_id   = "service-account-2"
# }

Then, you apply:

terraform apply -auto-approve

Next, additionally, you want to apply the code in "2nd.tf" so you need to uncomment the code in "2nd.tf":

1st.tf:

provider "google" {
  credentials = file("myCredentials.json")
  project     = "myproject-113738"
  region      = "asia-northeast1"
}

resource "google_project_service" "project" {
  service = "iam.googleapis.com"
  disable_dependent_services = true
}

2nd.tf (Uncomment):

resource "google_service_account" "service_account_1" {
  display_name = "Service Account 1"
  account_id   = "service-account-1"
}

resource "google_service_account" "service_account_2" {
  display_name = "Service Account 2"
  account_id   = "service-account-2"
}

Then, you apply:

terraform apply -auto-approve

This way, you can apply the selected code with comment out and uncomment.

Solution 5:^[5]

If you cant have terraform files in different folders like the other answers stated. You can try using my script GitHub repo for script

Which is a script that runs throughout a specific terraform file and outputs adds "-target=" to all modules names.

Solution 6:^[6]

This is a filler for the data block, as others have already explained resource block

You can also target data block if you're performing a read operation.

Lets say you have two files - create.tf and read.tf

Assuming create.tf is already applied:

resource "hashicups_order" "edu" {
  items {
    coffee {
      id = 3
    }
    quantity = 3
  }
  items {
    coffee {
      id = 2
    }
    quantity = 1
  }
}

output "edu_order" {
  value = hashicups_order.edu
}

And you only want to apply read.tf:

data "hashicups_ingredients" "first_coffee" {
  coffee_id = hashicups_order.edu.items[0].coffee[0].id
}

output "first_coffee_ingredients" {
  value = data.hashicups_ingredients.first_coffee
}

You can create a plan file targeting the read only data block:

terraform plan -target=data.hashicups_ingredients.first_coffee

And similarly, apply the read operation using Terraform:

terraform apply -target=data.hashicups_ingredients.first_coffee -auto-approve

Solution 7:^[7]

terraform apply -target nginx-docker.tf

Sources

This article follows the attribution requirements of Stack Overflow and is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.

Source: Stack Overflow

Solution	Source
Solution 1	Montaro
Solution 2	Taras Vaskiv
Solution 3	Mahattam
Solution 4
Solution 5	Bruno Gomes
Solution 6	Saurabh
Solution 7	Marcelo Guedes

'How to give a .tf file as input in Terraform Apply command?

Solution 1:[1]

Solution 2:[2]

Solution 3:[3]

Solution 4:[4]

Solution 5:[5]

Solution 6:[6]

Solution 7:[7]