Definitions
What these words actually mean
Infrastructure drift, Terraform vs OpenTofu, apply approvals, and the rest of the vocabulary that shows up in a production workspace.
- Infrastructure driftInfrastructure drift is the gap between what your Terraform or OpenTofu files declare and what actually exists in AWS, Azure, GCP, or OCI. Here is what causes it, why it matters, and how teams classify it.
- Terraform vs OpenTofuTerraform and OpenTofu share HCL, state, and most providers. They differ in license, release cadence, and who you trust to ship the binary. Here is how to choose — and when a migration is actually worth it.
- IaC governanceIaC governance is the set of rules, reviews, and identity controls that decide who can change cloud infrastructure, what a plan is allowed to do, and how exceptions expire. It is not a style guide for Terraform.
- Detect Terraform driftDetect Terraform drift by refreshing state, saving a plan, and classifying the diff — then add cloud inventory for resources Terraform does not manage. A practical scan loop you can run in CI.
- AI for infrastructure as codeAI can draft Terraform, explain a plan, and classify drift. It should not skip review, invent cloud APIs, or apply without a saved plan. What is useful today — and what still needs a human.
- Visual TerraformA visual Terraform workflow turns a repository or diagram into a topology you can review, then into a real plan file. The diagram is a lens. The plan is the source of truth.
- terraform apply approvalApprove a terraform apply by risk, not by job title. IAM, network, and data-store changes need a named owner. Tag hygiene should not wait on a director. How to design the gate without approval fatigue.
- OpenTofu migrationMove from Terraform to OpenTofu by pinning the binary, rehearsing plans in a clone of state, then cutting over CI — not by rewriting modules. A checklist for backends, providers, policy, and rollback.
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