Terraform and Ansible

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Infrastructure Provisioning and Configuration (Local System Setup)

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Now, in the next topic of this series, we will explore Terraform.

What is Terraform?

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Terraform allows you to automate and manage your infrastructure and platforms that run on your servers. It is open-source and uses a declarative approach—you define what end result you want, unlike imperative tools, which define how to get there step-by-step.

Terraform is a tool used for infrastructure provisioning.

For example:
You’ve started a project and want to deploy several servers to run a microservices application. You run Docker containers to bring the service up. Suppose you decide to build this on the AWS platform to host your entire infrastructure.

In this case, the DevOps engineer prepares and provisions the infrastructure, and the developer deploys the software on it. So, where does Terraform come in?
Terraform is used in the first part—infrastructure provisioning.

What is the Difference Between Terraform and Ansible?

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By definition, they may sound similar. Both are Infrastructure-as-Code (IaC) tools used for provisioning, configuring, and managing infrastructure.

However:

• Terraform is mainly an infrastructure provisioning tool. It can also deploy tools, but its core strength lies in setting up infrastructure.

• Ansible is mainly a configuration tool. Once the infrastructure is provisioned, Ansible configures it: installs software, deploys apps, and handles updates.

Ansible is more mature, while Terraform is relatively newer and more advanced in orchestration.

In best DevOps practices, both tools are used together to cover the entire setup end-to-end.

Provisioning and Configuration with Terraform and Ansible (Locally)

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We’ll now build and deploy a service locally using Terraform and Ansible.

Provisioning: Terraform Creates Ubuntu Container with SSH

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Step 1: Install Required Packages

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sudo pacman -S terraform docker ansible openssh

Make sure Docker is running:

sudo systemctl start docker
sudo systemctl enable docker

Step 2: Generate SSH Key (if not already)

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ssh-keygen -t rsa -f ~/.ssh/id_rsa -q -N ""

This creates:

• ~/.ssh/id_rsa → private key

• ~/.ssh/id_rsa.pub → public key

Explanation:

| Part | Explanation | | | | | ssh-keygen | Creates SSH key pairs | | -t rsa | Uses RSA encryption | | -f ~/.ssh/id_rsa | Saves private key here | | -q | Quiet mode | | -N "" | No passphrase (empty password) |

main.tf

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provider "docker" {}

resource "docker_image" "ubuntu" {
  name = "ubuntu:20.04"
}

resource "docker_container" "ubuntu_container" {
  name  = "ubuntu-terraform"
  image = docker_image.ubuntu.name

  ports {
    internal = 22
    external = 2222
  }

  network_mode = "bridge"

  command = [
    "sh", "-c",
    <<-EOT
      apt update &&
      apt install -y openssh-server sudo &&
      mkdir -p /var/run/sshd &&
      echo "PermitRootLogin yes" >> /etc/ssh/sshd_config &&
      echo "root:root" | chpasswd &&
      service ssh start &&
      tail -f /dev/null
    EOT
  ]
}

versions.tf

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terraform {
  required_providers {
    docker = {
      source = "kreuzwerker/docker"
    }
  }
  required_version = ">= 1.0.0"
}

Initialize and Apply Terraform

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terraform init
terraform apply -auto-approve

Confirm Container and SSH Access

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docker ps

It should show:

PORTS: 0.0.0.0:2222->22/tcp

Connect using:

ssh root@127.0.0.1 -p 2222
# Password: root

If you get a shell, SSH works.

Check Internet in Container

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docker exec -it ubuntu-terraform ping -c 4 8.8.8.8

If this fails, run:

docker exec -it ubuntu-terraform bash
echo "nameserver 8.8.8.8" > /etc/resolv.conf
apt update

Now your internet inside the container should work.

Configuration: Ansible to Set Up Apache in Ubuntu Container

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Now that we have provisioned the infrastructure locally, we move to the next step: configuring it using Ansible.

Create Ansible Directory

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mkdir ansible && cd ansible

Create Inventory File – inventory.ini

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[web]
localhost ansible_host=127.0.0.1 ansible_port=2222 ansible_user=root ansible_password=root ansible_connection=ssh ansible_ssh_common_args='-o StrictHostKeyChecking=no'

Explanation of Inventory

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| Line | Description | | | | | [web] | Group name | | localhost | Logical hostname | | ansible_host=127.0.0.1 | IP address | | ansible_port=2222 | Docker SSH port | | ansible_user=root | Username | | ansible_password=root | Password | | ansible_connection=ssh | Connection type | | ansible_ssh_common_args=... | Skip manual key confirmation |

Create Playbook – install_apache.yml

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- name: Install and start Apache Web Server via raw shell commands
  hosts: web
  gather_facts: no

  tasks:
    - name: Update APT cache
      raw: apt update

    - name: Install Apache2
      raw: apt install -y apache2

    - name: Start Apache now
      raw: service apache2 start

    - name: Verify Apache is running
      raw: service apache2 status || true

Run the Playbook

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Make sure you’re inside the ansible/ directory:

bashCopyEditansible-playbook -i inventory.ini install_apache.yml

Test Apache

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curl http://127.0.0.1:2222

You should see the default Apache welcome page.

Summary: What You’ve Achieved

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1. Provisioned an Ubuntu container with SSH using Terraform

2. Installed and started Apache inside it using Ansible

3. Verified that Apache is running and serving web pages

Conclusion

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This blog demonstrated how to integrate Terraform and Ansible to provision and configure a local server environment. Terraform handled the creation of the containerized infrastructure, while Ansible managed the configuration tasks such as installing and starting Apache.

This approach is practical for learning DevOps workflows and testing deployments locally before scaling to cloud platforms. Using both tools together ensures full automation from infrastructure setup to software deployment. In upcoming sections, this setup can be extended to platforms like AWS, offering even more powerful automation capabilities.

P.S.

If you spot any mistakes, feel free to point them out — we’re all here to learn together! 😊

Haris
FAST-NUCES
BS Computer Science | Class of 2027

🔗 Portfolio: zenvila.github.io🔗 GitHub: github.com/Zenvila🔗 LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/haris-shahzad-7b8746291**
🔬 Member: COLAB (Research Lab)**