Cloudflare + Terraform DNS Records (Updated: 20191110)

I use Cloudflare as a CDN everywhere I can via multiple domains for the different obsessions of mine.

The Cloudflare web-based GUI is intuitive and very easy to manage though I really hate manual entry of things, web-based or not. I like automation.

I also love Terraform.

Cloudflare and Terraform together make life so much easier.

This module can maintain Cloudflare DNS records and is usable with the following DNS types:

AAAA – IPv6 address

CNAME – Canonical name

SPF – Sender Policy Framework
TXT – Text record
MX – Mail Exchange records
NS – Name Server records
SRV – Service records
CAA – Certification Authority Authorization records

Later versions of this module will also allow for LOC records.

Here’s a very basic example of the module to create A and AAAA records through Cloudflare’s network:

module "cloudflare_dns_records" {
  source = "git::https://gitlab.com/geekandi-terraform/cloudflare-dns-record-module.git"
  domain = "example.com"

  # name, value, priority (integer), type, proxied
  multi_records = [
    "www"        , "192.0.2.1", 0, "A", "true"],
    "example.com", "192.0.2.1", 0, "A", "true"],
    "www"        , "2001:0db8:85a3:0000:0000:8a2e:0370:7334", 0, "AAAA", "true"],
    "example.com", "2001:0db8:85a3:0000:0000:8a2e:0370:7334", 0, "AAAA", "true"],
  ]

}

That looks easy. It is not very maintainable.

Let’s do this again but this time let’s use a vars file to allow for easier maintenance!

Let’s start with my example.com.tfvars file:

domain = "example.com"

# name, value, priority (integer), type, proxied
multi_records = [
  ["www"        , "192.0.2.1", 0, "A", "true"],
  ["example.com", "192.0.2.1", 0, "A", "true"],
  ["www"        , "2001:0db8:85a3:0000:0000:8a2e:0370:7334", 0, "AAAA", "true"],
  ["example.com", "2001:0db8:85a3:0000:0000:8a2e:0370:7334", 0, "AAAA", "true"],
  ["example.com", "mail.example.com", 10, "MX", "false"],
  ["example.com", "mail2.example.com", 20, "MX", "false"],
]

# item, proto, priority (integer), weight (integer), port (integer), target (no trailing dot)
srv_records = [
  ["_sip", "_tls", 1, 100, 443, "sipdir.online.lync.com"],
  ["_sipfederationtls", "_tcp", 1, 100, 5061, "sipfed.online.lync.com"],
]

# name, flags, tag, value
caa_records = [
  ["www", "0", "issue", "comodoca.com"],
  ["www", "0", "issue", "digicert.com"],
  ["www", "0", "issue", "globalsign.com"],
  ["example.com", "0", "issue", "comodoca.com"],
  ["example.com", "0", "issue", "digicert.com"],
  ["example.com", "0", "issue", "globalsign.com"],
]

And our new Terraform file:

module "cloudflare_dns_records" {
  source        = "git::https://gitlab.com/geekandi-terraform/cloudflare-dns-record-module.git"
  domain        = var.domain
  zone_id       = data.cloudflare_zones.active.zones[0].id
  multi_records = var.multi_records
  srv_records   = var.srv_records
  caa_records   = var.caa_records
}

Why is this easier? Because now, with a bit of effort on state storage, you can support each domain in a consistent fashion within Cloudflare by using Terraform and multiple vars files. I would suggest looking into using Terraform Workspaces with durable storage via S3.

Using a workspace set up you can do fun things using a S3 backend for the state file yet continue to keep good separation between your different domains.

Here’s a quick example script that forces the issue and I even left something for you, the reader, to finish.

#!/bin/sh

OPERATION=$1
WORKSPACE=$2

if [ -z "${WORKSPACE}" ] ; then
  echo "workspace MUST be passed as the 2nd argument"
  exit 77
fi

if [ -f vars/${WORKSPACE}.vars ] ; then
  echo "we are going to use ${WORKSPACE}.vars file for input"
else
  echo "vars file: vars/${WORKSPACE}.vars does not exist"
  exit 78
fi

case ${OPERATION} in
  plan)
    echo "delivering a plan.."
    echo ""
    terraform workspace select ${WORKSPACE}
    if [ $? -eq 1 ] ; then
      terraform workspace new ${WORKSPACE}
      terraform workspace select ${WORKSPACE}
    fi
    terraform plan -var-file vars/${WORKSPACE}.vars
    terraform workspace select default
    break
    ;;
  apply)
    echo "applying a change.."
    echo ""
    terraform workspace select ${WORKSPACE}
    if [ $? -eq 1 ] ; then
      echo "no workspace available, did you plan first?"
    fi
    terraform apply -var-file vars/${WORKSPACE}.vars
    terraform workspace select default
    break
    ;;
  destroy)
    echo "operating on a destroy"
    break
    ;;
  *)
    echo "are you daft?"
    exit 78
    ;;
esac

EDIT 20190306: Converted reusable module to Terraform 0.12
EDIT 20191110: Cloudflare updated their provider and things broke along the way so this has been updated to support the new requirements. You will need to make a data call to get the resulting zone_id that is now required. I have updated the example code below that uses the module and the repository below has an updated README.

I have written a couple of modules but for this post I am only referring to Cloudflare DNS Record Module.

I created a data.tf file to do this for me within my terraform directory:

module data "cloudflare_zones" "active" {
  filter {
    name = var.domain
  }
}

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