Deploy Arm virtual machines on Google Cloud Platform (GCP) using Terraform
Introduction
Automate virtual machine creation with Terraform
Deploy Arm instances on GCP and provide access via Jump Server
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Deploy an Arm based VM using Terraform

Generate an SSH key pair

Generate an SSH key pair (public key, private key) using ssh-keygen to use for Arm VMs access. To generate the key pair, follow this guide .

Note

If you already have an SSH key pair present in the ~/.ssh directory, you can skip this step.

Acquire GCP Access Credentials

The installation of Terraform on your Desktop/Laptop needs to communicate with GCP. Thus, Terraform needs to be authenticated.

To obtain GCP user credentials, follow this guide .

Terraform infrastructure

Add resources required to create a VM in main.tf.

Add below code in main.tf file:

provider "google" {
  project = "project_id"
  region  = "us-central1"
  zone    = "us-central1-a"
}

resource "google_compute_instance" "vm_instance" {
  name         = "instance-arm"
  machine_type = "c4a-standard-1"

  boot_disk {
    initialize_params {
      image = "ubuntu-os-cloud/ubuntu-2204-lts-arm64"
    }
  }

  network_interface {
    network = "default"
    access_config {
      // Ephemeral public IP
    }
  }

  metadata = {
    ssh-keys = "ubuntu:${file("~/.ssh/id_rsa.pub")}"
  }
}
Note

Replace project_ID with your value which can be found in the Dashboard of Google Cloud console.

Terraform commands

Initialize Terraform

Run terraform init to initialize the Terraform deployment. This command downloads all the modules required to manage your resources.

terraform init

The output should be similar to:

Initializing the backend...

Initializing provider plugins...
- Finding latest version of hashicorp/google...
- Reusing previous version of kreuzwerker/docker from the dependency lock file
- Installing hashicorp/google v4.61.0...
- Installed hashicorp/google v4.61.0 (signed by HashiCorp)
- Using previously-installed kreuzwerker/docker v2.23.1

Terraform has made some changes to the provider dependency selections recorded
in the .terraform.lock.hcl file. Review those changes and commit them to your
version control system if they represent changes you intended to make.

Terraform has been successfully initialized!

You may now begin working with Terraform. Try running "terraform plan" to see
any changes that are required for your infrastructure. All Terraform commands
should now work.

If you ever set or change modules or backend configuration for Terraform,
rerun this command to reinitialize your working directory. If you forget, other
commands will detect it and remind you to do so if necessary.

Create a Terraform execution plan

Run terraform plan to create an execution plan.

terraform plan -out main.tfplan

A long output of resources to be created will be printed.

Apply a Terraform execution plan

Run terraform apply to apply the execution plan to your cloud infrastructure. Below command creates all required infrastructure.

terraform apply main.tfplan

Output should be similar to:

__output__google_compute_instance.vm_instance: Creating...
__output__google_compute_instance.vm_instance: Still creating... [10s elapsed]
__output__google_compute_instance.vm_instance: Creation complete after 14s [id=projects/massive-woods-383015/zones/us-central1-a/instances/instance-arm]
__output__
__output__
__output__Apply complete! Resources: 1 added, 0 changed, 0 destroyed.

Verify created resource

In the Google Cloud console, go to the VM instances page . The VM created through Terraform must be displayed in the screen.

Image Alt Text:terraform4

SSH into the launched instance

Run following command to connect to VM through SSH:

ssh ubuntu@<Public IP>
Note

Replace <Public IP> with the instance’s IP.

Output should be similar to:

__output__The authenticity of host '34.91.147.54 (34.91.147.54)' can't be established.
__output__ECDSA key fingerprint is SHA256:xwUGlczMr7M0ekr3g4axqREera7wUsCc1vEWpeENUAo.
__output__Are you sure you want to continue connecting (yes/no/[fingerprint])? yes
__output__Warning: Permanently added '34.91.147.54' (ECDSA) to the list of known hosts.
__output__Welcome to Ubuntu 22.04.2 LTS (GNU/Linux 5.15.0-1030-gcp aarch64)

Clean up resources

Run terraform destroy to delete all resources created.

terraform destroy
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