Pulumi concepts

Pulumi is a modern infrastructure as code platform. It leverages existing programming languages—TypeScript, JavaScript, Python, Go, .NET, Java, and markup languages like YAML—and their native ecosystem to interact with cloud resources through the Pulumi SDK. A downloadable CLI, runtime, libraries, and a hosted service work together to deliver a robust way of provisioning, updating, and managing cloud infrastructure.

If this is your first time using Pulumi, you likely want to begin with the Getting Started guide for your cloud of choice. It will walk you through an AWS, Azure, Google Cloud, or Kubernetes deployment from start to finish.

Pulumi overview

This diagram illustrates the structure and major components of Pulumi.

Pulumi programming model diagram.

Pulumi programs, written in general-purpose programming languages, describe how your cloud infrastructure should be composed. To declare new infrastructure in your program, you allocate resource objects whose properties correspond to the desired state of your infrastructure. These properties are also used between resources to handle any necessary dependencies and can be exported outside of the stack, if needed.

Programs reside in a project, which is a directory that contains source code for the program and metadata on how to run the program. After writing your program, you run the Pulumi CLI command pulumi up from within your project directory. This command creates an isolated and configurable instance of your program, known as a stack. Stacks are similar to different deployment environments that you use when testing and rolling out application updates. For instance, you can have distinct development, staging, and production stacks that you create and test against.

Example

To illustrate these concepts, the following program shows how to create an AWS EC2 security group named web-sg with a single ingress rule and a t2.micro-sized EC2 instance using that security group.

To use the security group, the EC2 resource requires the security group’s ID. Pulumi enables this through the output property name on the security group resource. Pulumi understands dependencies between resources and uses the relationships between resources to maximize parallelism and ensures correct ordering when a stack is instantiated.

Finally, the server’s resulting IP address and DNS name are exported as stack outputs so that their values can be accessed through either a CLI command or by another stack.

"user strict";
const pulumi = require("@pulumi/pulumi");
const aws = require("@pulumi/aws");

const group = new aws.ec2.SecurityGroup("web-sg", {
    description: "Enable HTTP access",
    ingress: [{ protocol: "tcp", fromPort: 80, toPort: 80, cidrBlocks: ["0.0.0.0/0"] }],
});

const server = new aws.ec2.Instance("web-server", {
    ami: "ami-6869aa05",
    instanceType: "t2.micro",
    vpcSecurityGroupIds: [ group.name ], // reference the security group resource above
});

export const publicIp = server.publicIp;
export const publicDns = server.publicDns;

import * as pulumi from "@pulumi/pulumi";
import * as aws from "@pulumi/aws";

const group = new aws.ec2.SecurityGroup("web-sg", {
    description: "Enable HTTP access",
    ingress: [{ protocol: "tcp", fromPort: 80, toPort: 80, cidrBlocks: ["0.0.0.0/0"] }],
});

const server = new aws.ec2.Instance("web-server", {
    ami: "ami-6869aa05",
    instanceType: "t2.micro",
    vpcSecurityGroupIds: [ group.name ], // reference the security group resource above
});

export const publicIp = server.publicIp;
export const publicDns = server.publicDns;

import pulumi
import pulumi_aws as aws

group = aws.ec2.SecurityGroup('web-sg',
    description='Enable HTTP access',
    ingress=[
        { 'protocol': 'tcp', 'from_port': 80, 'to_port': 80, 'cidr_blocks': ['0.0.0.0/0'] }
    ])

server = aws.ec2.Instance('web-server',
    ami='ami-6869aa05',
    instance_type='t2.micro',
    vpc_security_group_ids=[group.name] # reference the security group resource above
)

pulumi.export('public_ip', server.public_ip)
pulumi.export('public_dns', server.public_dns)

package main

import (
	"github.com/pulumi/pulumi-aws/sdk/v4/go/aws/ec2"
	"github.com/pulumi/pulumi/sdk/v3/go/pulumi"
)

func main() {
	pulumi.Run(func(ctx *pulumi.Context) error {
		group, err := ec2.NewSecurityGroup(ctx, "web-sg", &ec2.SecurityGroupArgs{
			Description: pulumi.String("Enable HTTP access"),
			Ingress: ec2.SecurityGroupIngressArray{
				ec2.SecurityGroupIngressArgs{
					Protocol:   pulumi.String("tcp"),
					FromPort:   pulumi.Int(80),
					ToPort:     pulumi.Int(80),
					CidrBlocks: pulumi.StringArray{pulumi.String("0.0.0.0/0")},
				},
			},
		})
		if err != nil {
			return err
		}
		server, err := ec2.NewInstance(ctx, "web-server", &ec2.InstanceArgs{
			Ami:                 pulumi.String("ami-6869aa05"),
			InstanceType:        pulumi.String("t2.micro"),
			VpcSecurityGroupIds: pulumi.StringArray{group.Name},
		})
		if err != nil {
			return err
        }

		ctx.Export("publicIp", server.PublicIp)
		ctx.Export("publicHostName", server.PublicDns)
		return nil
	})
}

using System.Threading.Tasks;
using Pulumi;
using Pulumi.Aws.Ec2;
using Pulumi.Aws.Ec2.Inputs;

class Program
{
    static Task<int> Main() => Deployment.RunAsync<MyStack>();
}

class MyStack : Stack
{
    public MyStack()
    {
        var group = new SecurityGroup("web-sg", new SecurityGroupArgs {
            Description = "Enable HTTP access",
            Ingress = {
                new SecurityGroupIngressArgs {
                    Protocol = "tcp",
                    FromPort = 80,
                    ToPort = 80,
                    CidrBlocks = { "0.0.0.0/0" }
                }
            }
        });
        var server = new Instance("web-server", new InstanceArgs {
            Ami = "ami-6869aa05",
            InstanceType = "t2.micro",
            VpcSecurityGroupIds = { group.Name }
        });
        this.PublicIp = server.PublicIp;
        this.PublicDns = server.PublicDns;
    }

    [Output]
    public Output<string> PublicIp { get; set; }

    [Output]
    public Output<string> PublicDns { get; set; }
}

package myproject;

import com.pulumi.Context;
import com.pulumi.Exports;
import com.pulumi.Pulumi;
import com.pulumi.aws.ec2.Instance;
import com.pulumi.aws.ec2.InstanceArgs;
import com.pulumi.aws.ec2.SecurityGroup;
import com.pulumi.aws.ec2.SecurityGroupArgs;
import com.pulumi.aws.ec2.inputs.SecurityGroupIngressArgs;

import java.util.List;


public class App {
    public static void main(String[] args) {
        Pulumi.run(App::stack);
    }

    public static void stack(Context ctx) {
        final var group = new SecurityGroup("web-sg",
            SecurityGroupArgs.builder()
            .description("Enable HTTP access")
            .ingress(SecurityGroupIngressArgs.builder()
                .protocol("tcp")
                .fromPort(80)
                .toPort(80)
                .cidrBlocks("0.0.0.0/0")
                .build())
            .build());
        final var server = new Instance("web-server",
            InstanceArgs.builder()
                .ami("ami-6869aa05")
                .instanceType("t2.micro")
                .vpcSecurityGroupIds(group.name().applyValue(List::of))
                .build());
        ctx.export("publicIp", server.publicIp());
        ctx.export("publicDns", server.publicDns());
    }
}

resources:
  group:
    type: aws:ec2:SecurityGroup
    properties:
      description: Enable HTTP access
      ingress:
        - protocol: tcp
          fromPort: 80
          toPort: 80
          cidrBlocks: ["0.0.0.0/0"]
  server:
    type: aws:ec2:Instance
    properties:
      ami: ami-6869aa05
      instanceType: t2.micro
      vpcSecurityGroupIds: ${group.name}
outputs:
  publicIp: ${server.publicIp}
  publicDns: ${server.publicDns}

Concept details

The following topics provide more details on the core concepts of Pulumi and how to use it:

Pulumi concepts

Pulumi overview

Example

Concept details

How Pulumi Works

Projects

Stacks

State and Backends

Resources

Inputs and Outputs

Configuration

Secrets

Assets and Archives

Function Serialization

Logging