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Pulumi: Code Infrastructure As Code

PengB
5 min readDec 19, 2022

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Photo by Yulia Matvienko on Unsplash

After posting my last blog Terraform “Zero Cloud”: how to create a GitLab Runner, I thought about writing a blog on its young brother Pulumi, another IaC tool. The first stable version of Pulumi is released in December 2017.

In the Blog Labs section, I will use Pulumi Python to run a docker container running a Super Mario Web Game.

If you are a Terraform user, you understand in 10 seconds that what is Pulumi:

  • Terraform and Pulumi are both using Declarative way.
  • Architecture is the same, they all use Providers to translate configuration files to API calls.
  • Like Terraform Registry, Pulumi has his own registry - Pulumi Registry, in which you find the Pulumi Providers.
  • Both depend on Resource and Date (get functions for Pulumi), both support Module
  • They manage State and support different local workspaces, called “stack” in Pulumi.
  • Similar Command lines.
  • 💡 Different in declarative language, HCL(mix of json and yaml) for Terraform and native programming language(Python, TypeScript, JavaScript, Go, C#, F#, Java, yaml) for Pulumi.

The main difference of the 2 tools are located in coding language. You can even convert Terraform script easily to Pulumi supported programming language.

So we have already Terraform, why Pulumi? It’s interesting in the tech world like in the real world, there are always the similar tools, and all existing for some raisons around business, marketing, customer, or even their foundators. That’s why we have Coca-cola and also Pepsi, AWS and also GCP/Azure, docker and podman etc.

Pulumi gives programmers a framework to do IaC with their favorite programming language!

To give you a first image on Pulumi and Terraform, we use python and docker provider.

Terraform example:

terraform {
  required_providers {
    docker = {
      source  = "kreuzwerker/docker"
      version = "2.23.1"
    }
  }
}

provider "docker" {
  host = "unix:///var/run/docker.sock"
}

# Pulls the image
resource "docker_image" "supermario" {
  name = "pengbai/docker-supermario:latest"
}

# Create a container
resource "docker_container" "supermario" {
  image = docker_image.ubuntu.image_id
  name  = "supermario"
}

Pulumi Python example :

# install python pulumi docker provider package
➜  pip install pulumi_docker
# configure provider config
➜  pulumi config set docker:host unix:///var/run/docker.sock
import pulumi_docker as docker

image = docker.RemoteImage("supermario",
  name='pengbai/docker-supermario:latest'
)

container = docker.Container("supermario",
  image=image.image_id,
  name = "supermario"
)

Blog Labs

Let’s run a Super Mario Web Game in docker container on my laptop to test Pulumi by Python!

Create project “pulumi_docker” by Python code:

➜  tree -a pulumi_docker
pulumi_docker
├── pulumi-backend
├── Pulumi.yaml
├── requirements.txt
└── __main__.py

Same as Terraform, Pulumi use backend to save state, here we use local backend in the pulumi-backend folder.

Let’s check the project configuration metadata Pulumi.yaml

name: docker-python
runtime: python
description: A pulumi app that run docker container on local laptop
backend:
  url: file://./pulumi-backend
stackConfigDir: config/

It’s a python applicaion, we need dependencies lib and defined in requrement.txt

pulumi>=3.49.0
pulumi-docker>=3.6.1

Don’t forget to install these python lib by:

➜  pip install -r requirements.txt

In the main function we define the Resource managed by Pulumi:

import pulumi_docker as docker

# pull image 
image = docker.RemoteImage("supermario",
  name='pengbai/docker-supermario:latest', keep_locally=True
)

# run container
container = docker.Container("supermario",
  image=image.image_id, name = "supermario",
  ports=[{
    "internal": 8080,
    "external": 8600
  }]
)

That’s all for the example!

Run Pulumi Cli

Before play pulumi commands. Ensure that the python requirements are installed.

Basic Pulumi commands:

  • pulumi stack init
  • pulumi config set [key] [value]
  • pulumi preview
  • pulumi up

Create stack dev, and create passphrase:

# create environment - pulumi stack
➜  pulumi stack init
stack name: (dev)
Created stack 'dev'
Enter your passphrase to protect config/secrets:
Re-enter your passphrase to confirm:

Check stack:

➜  pulumi stack ls
NAME  LAST UPDATE  RESOURCE COUNT
dev*  n/a          n/a

Add Docker Provider config:

➜  pulumi config set docker:host unix:///var/run/docker.sock

Run preview to check the changes, enter the passphrase created during the stack init:

➜  pulumi preview
Enter your passphrase to unlock config/secrets
    (set PULUMI_CONFIG_PASSPHRASE or PULUMI_CONFIG_PASSPHRASE_FILE to remember):
Previewing update (dev):
     Type                         Name               Plan
 +   pulumi:pulumi:Stack          docker-python-dev  create
 +   ├─ docker:index:RemoteImage  supermario         create
 +   └─ docker:index:Container    supermario         create


Resources:
    + 3 to create

It rests only to run up:

➜  pulumi up
Enter your passphrase to unlock config/secrets
    (set PULUMI_CONFIG_PASSPHRASE or PULUMI_CONFIG_PASSPHRASE_FILE to remember):
Previewing update (dev):
     Type                         Name               Plan
 +   pulumi:pulumi:Stack          docker-python-dev  create
 +   ├─ docker:index:RemoteImage  supermario         create
 +   └─ docker:index:Container    supermario         create


Resources:
    + 3 to create

Do you want to perform this update? details
+ pulumi:pulumi:Stack: (create)
    [urn=urn:pulumi:dev::docker-python::pulumi:pulumi:Stack::docker-python-dev]
    + docker:index/remoteImage:RemoteImage: (create)
        [urn=urn:pulumi:dev::docker-python::docker:index/remoteImage:RemoteImage::supermario]
        [provider=urn:pulumi:dev::docker-python::pulumi:providers:docker::default_3_6_1::04da6b54-80e4-46f7-96ec-b56ff0331ba9]
        keepLocally: true
        name       : "pengbai/docker-supermario"
    + docker:index/container:Container: (create)
        [urn=urn:pulumi:dev::docker-python::docker:index/container:Container::supermario]
        [provider=urn:pulumi:dev::docker-python::pulumi:providers:docker::default_3_6_1::04da6b54-80e4-46f7-96ec-b56ff0331ba9]
        attach                                 : false
        containerReadRefreshTimeoutMilliseconds: 15000
        image                                  : output<string>
        logs                                   : false
        mustRun                                : true
        name                                   : "supermario"
        ports                                  : [
            [0]: {
                external  : 8600
                internal  : 8080
                ip        : "0.0.0.0"
                protocol  : "tcp"
            }
        ]
        readOnly                               : false
        removeVolumes                          : true
        restart                                : "no"
        rm                                     : false
        start                                  : true
        stdinOpen                              : false
        tty                                    : false
        wait                                   : false
        waitTimeout                            : 60

Do you want to perform this update? yes
Updating (dev):
     Type                         Name               Status
 +   pulumi:pulumi:Stack          docker-python-dev  created (0.01s)
 +   ├─ docker:index:RemoteImage  supermario         created (17s)
 +   └─ docker:index:Container    supermario         created (3s)


Resources:
    + 3 created

Duration: 22s

check current stack state:

➜  pulumi stack
Enter your passphrase to unlock config/secrets
    (set PULUMI_CONFIG_PASSPHRASE or PULUMI_CONFIG_PASSPHRASE_FILE to remember):
Current stack is dev:
    Managed by WL-GHB0GB3
    Last updated: 29 minutes ago (2022-12-19 19:20:47.9362312 +0100 CET)
    Pulumi version used: v3.49.0
Current stack resources (4):
    TYPE                                     NAME
    pulumi:pulumi:Stack                      docker-python-dev
    ├─ docker:index/remoteImage:RemoteImage  supermario
    ├─ docker:index/container:Container      supermario
    └─ pulumi:providers:docker               default_3_6_1

Current stack outputs (0):
    No output values currently in this stack

Use `pulumi stack select` to change stack; `pulumi stack ls` lists known ones

OK, now we have the docker image pulled and the container super-mario game running on my laptop:

➜  docker images
REPOSITORY                 TAG     IMAGE ID       CREATED         SIZE
pengbai/docker-supermario  latest  077ed8c9236a   3 years ago     646MB

➜  docker ps
CONTAINER ID   IMAGE          COMMAND             CREATED          STATUS          PORTS                    NAMES
6c9812cd40c5   077ed8c9236a   "catalina.sh run"   30 minutes ago   Up 30 minutes   0.0.0.0:8600->8080/tcp   supermario

Let’s check on navigator the localhost:8600:

Great! The game running in the container is ready!

Then you can remove all these resources by running “pulumi destroy”:

➜  pulumi destroy
Enter your passphrase to unlock config/secrets
    (set PULUMI_CONFIG_PASSPHRASE or PULUMI_CONFIG_PASSPHRASE_FILE to remember):
Previewing destroy (dev):
     Type                         Name               Plan
 -   pulumi:pulumi:Stack          docker-python-dev  delete
 -   ├─ docker:index:Container    supermario         delete
 -   └─ docker:index:RemoteImage  supermario         delete


Resources:
    - 3 to delete

Do you want to perform this destroy? yes
Destroying (dev):
     Type                         Name               Status
 -   pulumi:pulumi:Stack          docker-python-dev  deleted
 -   ├─ docker:index:Container    supermario         deleted (0.45s)
 -   └─ docker:index:RemoteImage  supermario         deleted (0.00s)


Resources:
    - 3 deleted

Duration: 1s

The resources in the stack have been deleted, but the history and configuration associated with the stack are still maintained.
If you want to remove the stack completely, run `pulumi stack rm dev`.

What do you think about the Pulumi? 😉

Happy Reading!

Pulumi
Iac
Docker
Cloud
Terraform

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PengB

Written by PengB

18 Followers

an IT guy @Adeo DevDataOps. Like nature and self-challenge. Former @WorldlineExpertCommunity.

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