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Terraform VS AWS Secrets Manager

Compare Terraform VS AWS Secrets Manager and see what are their differences

Flagsmith
Flagsmith lets you manage feature flags and remote config across web, mobile and server side applications. Deliver true Continuous Integration. Get builds out faster. Control who has access to new features. We're Open Source. featured
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Terraform logo Terraform

Tool for building, changing, and versioning infrastructure safely and efficiently.

AWS Secrets Manager logo AWS Secrets Manager

AWS Secrets Manager to Rotate, Manage, Retrieve Secrets
  • Terraform Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-09-24
  • AWS Secrets Manager Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-03-15

Terraform features and specs

  • Infrastructure as Code
    Terraform allows you to define your infrastructure in configuration files that can be versioned and stored in a version control system. This makes it easy to track changes, roll back if necessary, and collaborate with team members.
  • Multi-Cloud Support
    Terraform supports various cloud providers such as AWS, Azure, Google Cloud, and others. This allows you to manage your entire infrastructure using a single tool, regardless of the underlying provider.
  • Immutability
    Terraform promotes immutable infrastructure, meaning once a component is created, it is not modified in place but replaced if changes are needed. This leads to more predictable and stable deployments.
  • State Management
    Terraform maintains the state of your infrastructure, which helps in tracking resource changes over time and making incremental updates. This is crucial for applying changes in a controlled manner.
  • Community and Ecosystem
    Terraform has a large and active community, along with a rich ecosystem of providers and modules. This makes it easier to find support, share solutions, and leverage pre-built components.

Possible disadvantages of Terraform

  • Complex State Management
    While state management is a significant feature, managing state files can become complex and risky. Issues like state file corruption or sharing between team members can lead to challenges.
  • Learning Curve
    Terraform has a steep learning curve for beginners, especially those who are not familiar with infrastructure as code concepts or the HashiCorp Configuration Language (HCL).
  • Partial Updates
    Terraform's plan and apply operations are not atomic, meaning that partial updates can sometimes leave your infrastructure in an inconsistent state if an error occurs during execution.
  • Dependency Management
    Managing dependencies between resources can be challenging in Terraform. Misconfigured dependencies can lead to issues during resource creation, deletion, or updates.
  • Cost Management
    While Terraform is excellent for provisioning resources, it does not have built-in cost management or optimization features. Users need to rely on third-party tools to manage and optimize costs.

AWS Secrets Manager features and specs

  • Automated Secret Rotation
    AWS Secrets Manager provides built-in support for automatic rotation of secrets, which enhances security by frequently changing passwords and other sensitive information.
  • Centralized Secret Management
    You can manage all your secrets from a single location, simplifying the process of keeping track of credentials, API keys, and other sensitive data across various applications and services.
  • Integration with AWS Services
    AWS Secrets Manager is well integrated with other AWS services such as RDS, Redshift, and IAM, making it easier to manage and retrieve secrets within the AWS ecosystem.
  • Fine-Grained Access Control
    Utilizes AWS IAM to provide fine-grained access control policies, allowing you to precisely define who can access specific secrets, enhancing security.
  • Secure Secret Storage
    Secrets are stored securely using encryption standards provided by AWS Key Management Service (KMS), ensuring that the data is protected both at rest and in transit.
  • Audit and Compliance
    AWS Secrets Manager facilitates compliance with regulatory requirements by providing logging and monitoring capabilities, enabling you to track access and changes to secrets.

Possible disadvantages of AWS Secrets Manager

  • Cost
    AWS Secrets Manager can be more expensive compared to other secret management solutions, especially as the number of stored secrets and API requests increase.
  • Vendor Lock-In
    Relying on AWS Secrets Manager can increase dependency on AWS services, which might be a drawback if you are considering a multi-cloud strategy.
  • Complexity
    The integration and setup process can be complex, especially for organizations without prior AWS experience, potentially requiring a steep learning curve.
  • API Limits
    AWS imposes API request limits, which might be restrictive for applications with high-frequency secret access needs, potentially resulting in throttling issues.
  • Regional Availability
    Not all AWS regions may support Secrets Manager, which can be a constraint for global applications that require multi-region deployments.

Terraform videos

+ Add

Wampler Terraform | Reverb Tone Report Demo

More videos:

  • Review - MOD PEDAL POWERHOUSE! Wampler TERRAFORM
  • Demo - IT'S FINALLY HERE! | Wampler Terraform Demo | It's as good as you hoped!!!

AWS Secrets Manager videos

+ Add

Understanding AWS Secrets Manager - AWS Online Tech Talks

More videos:

  • Review - AWS Secrets Manager
  • Tutorial - Python - How to access DB credentials from AWS Secrets Manager? | AWS Secrets Manager Tutorial

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to Terraform and AWS Secrets Manager)

Terraform

AWS Secrets Manager

DevOps Tools
100 100%
DevOps Tools
0% 0
Identity And Access Management
0 0%
Identity And Access Management
100% 100
Developer Tools
100 100%
Developer Tools
0% 0
Identity Provider
0 0%
Identity Provider
100% 100

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare Terraform and AWS Secrets Manager

Terraform Reviews

Do not use AWS CloudFormation
Terraform, on the other hand, will occupy your shell until the directly-involved AWS service coughs up an error. No additional tooling is required. Terraform will just relay the error message from the affected service indicating what you’ve done wrong.
Source: gswallow.medium.com
Top 5 Ansible Alternatives in 2022: Server Automation Solutions by Alexander Fashakin on the 19th Aug 2021 facebook Linked In Twitter
Although Terraform and Ansible are both server automation tools, there are still a few significant differences between the two. For example, Terraform is declarative while Ansible allows for both procedural configurations and declarative configurations. Also, Ansible works best as a configuration management tool while Terraform leans towards cloud orchestration.
Source: www.servertribe.com
35+ Of The Best CI/CD Tools: Organized By Category
Terraform is compatible with a wide range of Cloud providers, including Azure, VMWare, and AWS. If you’re subscribed to multiple cloud providers, Terraform is a great way to ensure that they have consistent configurations.
Source: www.cloudzero.com
Why we use Terraform and not Chef, Puppet, Ansible, SaltStack, or CloudFormation
Example: Terraform and Ansible. You use Terraform to deploy all the underlying infrastructure, including the network topology (i.e., VPCs, subnets, route tables), data stores (e.g., MySQL, Redis), load balancers, and servers. You then use Ansible to deploy your apps on top of those servers.This is an easy approach to start with, as there is no extra infrastructure to run...
Source: blog.gruntwork.io
Ansible overtakes Chef and Puppet as the top cloud configuration management tool
Breaking these results down year-over-year, use of Ansible grew from 36% in 2018 to 41% in 2019--surpassing Chef, which grew from 36% to 37%, as well as Puppet, which grew from 34% to 37%. Rounding out the list is Terraform, which experienced a jump from 20% to 31%, and Salt, which increased in usage from 13% to 18%.
Source: www.techrepublic.com

AWS Secrets Manager Reviews

We have no reviews of AWS Secrets Manager yet.
Be the first one to post

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, AWS Secrets Manager should be more popular than Terraform. It has been mentiond 76 times since March 2021. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

Terraform mentions (32)

  • Scaffolding Serverless Web Application on AWS
    Terraform is an infrastructure as code tool that lets you build, change, and version infrastructure safely and efficiently. Terraform code is in the terraform directory. - Source: dev.to / 10 months ago
  • Integrating Terraform with CI/CD Pipelines
    In recent years, there has been a significant shift towards automation of infrastructure deployment processes. One popular tool that has emerged as a key player in this space is Terraform, an open-source infrastructure as code (IaC) software tool developed by HashiCorp. This article will explore how Terraform can be integrated into continuous integration and delivery (CI/CD) pipelines using GitHub Actions as an... - Source: dev.to / about 1 year ago
  • Deploying Your Outdoor Activities Map with Terraform
    Terraform is an open-source infrastructure-as-code software tool created by HashiCorp. It allows you to define and manage your infrastructure as code, making it easy to provision and manage resources across multiple cloud providers. With Terraform, you can ensure consistent and repeatable deployments, making it an ideal choice for automating your cloud infrastructure. - Source: dev.to / over 1 year ago
  • Trigger CI using Terraform Cloud
    Continuous Integration(CI) pipelines needs a target infrastructure to which the CI artifacts are deployed. The deployments are handled by CI or we can leverage Continuous Deployment pipelines. Modern day architecture uses automation tools like terraform, ansible to provision the target infrastructure, this type of provisioning is called IaaC. - Source: dev.to / about 2 years ago
  • Using Let's Encrypt with the Puppet Enterprise console
    Had an itch I've been meaning to scratch for a while. I build my Puppet environment using Terraform, which makes it nice and easy to tear things down and rebuild them. That is great, but it does leave me with an issue when it comes to the console SSL certificates. - Source: dev.to / about 2 years ago
View more

AWS Secrets Manager mentions (76)

  • Your Plaintext Email is a DevSecOps Blind Spot
    A Hardened Channel for Sensitive Communication: While dedicated secrets management tools (like HashiCorp Vault, AWS Secrets Manager, etc.) are essential for storing and managing application secrets, secure E2EE email provides a significantly safer channel for human-to-human communication that might involve discussing sensitive topics, sharing unavoidable one-off credentials (with immediate rotation plans), or... - Source: dev.to / about 1 month ago
  • Building Custom Kendra Connectors and Managing Data Sources with IaC
    Some data sources are protected by some form of credentials. Unless the data source is a public website or stored in another AWS resource such as Amazon S3, Kendra or your custom data source will need credentials to fetch data. In either case, AWS Secrets Manager can be used to securely manage your credentials. - Source: dev.to / about 2 months ago
  • Deploy AWS Lambda Functions and Amazon DynamoDB with AWS CDK on LocalStack
    In this example, we need to set up two AWS Lambda, AWS Secrets Manager and Amazon DynamoDB resources. - Source: dev.to / about 2 months ago
  • Enhancing Your CI/CD Security: Tips and Techniques to Mitigate Risks
    You have to handle secrets like API keys and passwords carefully. Instead of hardcoding them into your code, you should use secure secrets management tools like HashiCorp Vault or AWS Secrets Manager. Additionally, following API key authentication best practices ensures secure handling of sensitive credentials. This keeps sensitive information protected and reduces the risk of accidental leaks. - Source: dev.to / 2 months ago
  • Starters Guide: End-to-End Guide to Building with LLMs on SageMaker
    Credential Management: Avoid storing sensitive data like access keys directly, utilizing AWS Secrets Manager, or using environment variables. - Source: dev.to / 3 months ago
View more

What are some alternatives?

When comparing Terraform and AWS Secrets Manager, you can also consider the following products

Rancher - Open Source Platform for Running a Private Container Service

Microsoft Azure Active Directory - Azure Active Directory is a comprehensive identity and access management cloud solution that provides a robust set of capabilities to manage users and groups and help secure access to applications including Microsoft online services like Office 365 …

Puppet Enterprise - Get started with Puppet Enterprise, or upgrade or expand.

SecureLink for Enterprise - Privileged Access Management

Packer - Packer is an open-source software for creating identical machine images from a single source configuration.

JumpCloud - Cloud-based directory services. Alternative to Microsoft Active Directory.

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