HashiCorp Terraform Associate Practice Test

A new hire is learning Terraform and asks how it decides what actions to take. A colleague explains that with Terraform you write configuration that describes the end result you want, and Terraform figures out the create, update, or delete steps needed to reach it. Which term best describes this approach to Infrastructure as Code?

A developer is documenting the standard day-to-day Terraform workflow for a brand-new working directory, from first checkout to provisioned infrastructure. Which sequence of commands reflects the correct core workflow?

An engineer clones a repository that uses the AWS provider and a registry module, then runs terraform init before anything else. Which statement best summarises the primary purpose of this command?

An engineer is choosing between collection types for a module input and wants to confirm how list and map types behave in Terraform. Which statement is correct?

A developer writes a simple configuration with no backend or cloud block and runs terraform apply. What is the name of the file where Terraform stores state on the local disk by default?

A junior engineer is learning which Terraform commands can actually create, modify, or destroy real cloud resources versus those that only read or analyse configuration. Which of the following commands can change real infrastructure?

A platform team keeps a reusable networking module in a subdirectory at ./modules/network. An engineer wants to call this module from the root configuration and pass it a CIDR block as an input. Which block correctly calls the local module?

A platform team is moving to HCP Terraform and a new engineer asks what a single HCP Terraform workspace actually represents. Which description is most accurate?

A platform engineer is creating one aws_s3_bucket per environment name from the set ["dev", "staging", "prod"]. They want each bucket tracked in state under a stable key based on its environment name, so that adding or removing one environment never disturbs the others. Which meta-argument should they use, and why?

An engineer wants to view all of the stored attributes (such as the ID, ARN, and tags) of one specific resource that Terraform is tracking, for example aws_instance.web, directly from the state without contacting the cloud provider. Which command shows the attributes of that single resource?

An architect states the following during a design review: "Terraform is cloud-agnostic. Through its provider ecosystem it can manage resources on AWS, Azure, Google Cloud, on-premises platforms, and many SaaS services using the same configuration language and workflow." Is this statement true or false?

An engineer is setting up a new repository and is deciding what to commit to Git. A teammate claims the .terraform.lock.hcl dependency lock file should be committed so that everyone installs identical provider versions. Is the statement "The .terraform.lock.hcl file should be committed to version control" true or false?

An engineer wants their team's Terraform files to follow a consistent indentation and alignment style before committing. Which command automatically rewrites .tf files to the canonical HashiCorp formatting?

A platform team is moving from a local state file on one laptop to a shared remote backend so multiple engineers can collaborate safely. Which of the following is a genuine benefit of using a remote backend instead of local state?

After applying a configuration, an engineer wants Terraform to print the public DNS name of a load balancer so it can be consumed by another tool and shown at the end of terraform apply. The attribute is aws_lb.app.dns_name. Which block correctly exposes this value?

An automated deployment pipeline runs terraform apply in a non-interactive environment. The job hangs because Terraform is waiting for someone to type yes at the approval prompt. The engineer wants Terraform to apply the planned changes without pausing for interactive confirmation, while still letting Terraform compute the plan at apply time. Which approach is correct?

An engineer wants to pin a module to a specific version and is unsure when the version argument inside a module block is actually honoured by Terraform. For which kind of module source is the version argument valid?

A team is evaluating what moving to HCP Terraform would give them beyond a plain remote backend. Which capability does HCP Terraform provide?

An engineer wants to stop Terraform from managing a shared S3 bucket but must keep the real bucket and its data intact. A teammate warns that running terraform state rm on the bucket will delete it from the cloud. Is the statement "Running terraform state rm on a resource destroys the underlying real cloud resource" true or false?

A team needs to look up the ID of an existing, centrally managed Route 53 hosted zone so they can add DNS records to it. They must not create, modify, or destroy the hosted zone itself; another team owns it. They only need to read its attributes. Which Terraform block type should they use?