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Azure Resource Manager vs Pulumi: What are the differences?
Introduction
Azure Resource Manager and Pulumi are both infrastructure-as-code tools that help provision and manage cloud resources. However, they have some key differences that set them apart.
Language Support: Azure Resource Manager (ARM) uses JSON or Azure Resource Manager Templates (ARM Templates) as the primary language for defining the infrastructure. On the other hand, Pulumi supports multiple languages such as Python, TypeScript, JavaScript, and Go, allowing developers to choose a language they are comfortable with.
Provider Support: ARM is specific to the Azure ecosystem and provides a comprehensive set of resource providers for managing Azure resources. Pulumi, on the other hand, supports multiple cloud providers including Azure, AWS, Google Cloud, and Kubernetes, making it a cross-cloud platform for managing resources.
Resource Modeling: ARM uses a declarative approach to resource modeling. Developers define the desired state of the infrastructure, and ARM handles the creation and management of resources to achieve that state. Pulumi, on the other hand, uses a imperative approach where developers write actual code to define and manage resources, giving them more flexibility and control over the infrastructure.
Programmability: ARM provides a REST API and Azure CLI for interacting with Azure resources programmatically. Pulumi, on the other hand, offers a rich programming model with SDKs for various programming languages, allowing developers to leverage the full power of their chosen language to define and manage resources.
Stack Management: ARM manages resources at a subscription level, and resources are grouped into resource groups. Pulumi introduces the concept of stacks, which are isolated instances of the infrastructure. This allows developers to manage different environments or variations of the infrastructure using separate stacks.
Continuous Delivery: ARM supports continuous delivery through Azure DevOps or other CI/CD tools, allowing for automated deployments. Pulumi also supports continuous delivery and integrates well with popular CI/CD tools. However, Pulumi's imperative approach to infrastructure management provides more flexibility in implementing complex deployment and automation scenarios.
In Summary, Azure Resource Manager and Pulumi differ in terms of language support, provider support, resource modeling, programmability, stack management, and continuous delivery capabilities.
Because Pulumi uses real programming languages, you can actually write abstractions for your infrastructure code, which is incredibly empowering. You still 'describe' your desired state, but by having a programming language at your fingers, you can factor out patterns, and package it up for easier consumption.
We use Terraform to manage AWS cloud environment for the project. It is pretty complex, largely static, security-focused, and constantly evolving.
Terraform provides descriptive (declarative) way of defining the target configuration, where it can work out the dependencies between configuration elements and apply differences without re-provisioning the entire cloud stack.
AdvantagesTerraform is vendor-neutral in a way that it is using a common configuration language (HCL) with plugins (providers) for multiple cloud and service providers.
Terraform keeps track of the previous state of the deployment and applies incremental changes, resulting in faster deployment times.
Terraform allows us to share reusable modules between projects. We have built an impressive library of modules internally, which makes it very easy to assemble a new project from pre-fabricated building blocks.
DisadvantagesSoftware is imperfect, and Terraform is no exception. Occasionally we hit annoying bugs that we have to work around. The interaction with any underlying APIs is encapsulated inside 3rd party Terraform providers, and any bug fixes or new features require a provider release. Some providers have very poor coverage of the underlying APIs.
Terraform is not great for managing highly dynamic parts of cloud environments. That part is better delegated to other tools or scripts.
Terraform state may go out of sync with the target environment or with the source configuration, which often results in painful reconciliation.
Pros of Azure Resource Manager
- Bicep - Simple Declarative Language3
- Infrastructure-as-Code1
- Over 1K samples the QuickStart repo1
- Deep integration with Azure services like Azure Policy1
- Day 1 resource support1
- RBAC and Policies in templates1
- Versioned deployment via Blueprints1
Pros of Pulumi
- Infrastructure as code with less pain7
- Best-in-class kubernetes support4
- Great CLI2
- Simple2
- Can use many languages2
- Built-in secret management1
- Can be self-hosted1
- Multi-cloud1