Terraform - creating a list(string) for Azure locations

Question

I'm trying to deploy a resource group to several locations using Terraform in Azure but get the error: "Inappropriate value for attribute "location": string required."

I'm very new to Terraform so I'm not sure why this doesn't work.

My code:

locals {
  webappsperloc = 4
}

resource "azurerm_resource_group" "rg" {
  count    = length(var.webapplocs)
  name     = "whatever${count.index}"
  location = var.webapplocs[count.index]
  tags     = var.tags

}

resource "random_string" "webapprnd" {
  length  = 8
  lower   = true
  number  = true
  upper   = false
  special = false
}

resource "azurerm_app_service_plan" "plan" {
  count               = length(var.webapplocs)
  name                = "whatever-${var.webapplocs[count.index]}"
  location            = var.webapplocs[count.index]
  resource_group_name = element(azurerm_resource_group.rg.*.name,count.index)
  tags                = var.tags

  sku {
    tier = "standard"
    size = "S1"
  }
}
resource "azurerm_app_service" "app" {
  count               = local.webappsperloc
  name                = format("webapp-%s-%02d-%s", random_string.webapprnd.result, count.index + 1, element(var.webapplocs, count.index))
  resource_group_name = element(azurerm_resource_group.rg.*.name,count.index)
  location            = element(var.webapplocs, count.index)
  app_service_plan_id = element(azurerm_app_service_plan.plan.*.id, count.index)
  https_only          = true

  site_config {
    dotnet_framework_version = "v4.0"
    always_on                = true
    ftps_state               = "Disabled"
    min_tls_version          = "1.2"
  }

  # tags = {
  #   environment = var.tags
  #   source      = "terraform"
  # }
}

variable "webapplocs" {
  default = ["northeurope", "westeurope", "eastus", "uksouth"]
}

#variable "loc" {
#  description = "Default Azure region"
#  default     = "northeurope"
#}

variable "tags" {
  default = {
    source = "Terraform"
    env    = "Dev"
  }
}

#terraform.tfvars


loc = "northeurope"

tags = {
  source = "terrafrom"
  env    = "Dev"
}

webapplocs = ["northeurope","westeurope","eastus","uksouth"]

terraform {
  required_providers {
    azure = {
      source  = "hashicorp/azurerm"
      version = "=2.76.0"
    }
  }
  backend "azurerm" {
    resource_group_name  = "xxxx"
    storage_account_name = "xxxx"
    container_name       = "xxxx"
    key                  = "xxxx"
  }
}

# azure provider
provider "azure" {
  features {}
}

If you need anything else please let me know. I've used this function before without issue.

Thanks.

edit: code updated to reflect what I managed to get working.

Answer 1

Based on the error you are getting, I think this is related to invalid attribute reference on this line:

location = var.location

The azurerm_resource_group resource requires only a single value for location and you are providing a list of strings (based on the location variable definition), so you get the error:

"Inappropriate value for attribute "location": string required."

Since you want resource groups in all regions (ie, location ), I would suggest using for_each [1] instead of count .

That way you will be able to have one of each resources per region. How this would work (and there might be more elegant ways of doing it):

resource "azurerm_resource_group" "rg" {
  for_each = toset(var.location)
  name     = "${each.value}-${var.resource_group_name}"
  location = each.value

  tags = {
    environment = var.environment
    source      = "terraform"
  }
}

resource "azurerm_app_service_plan" "plan" {
  for_each            = toset(var.location)
  name                = "${each.value}-${var.app_service_plan}"
  location            = azurerm_resource_group.rg[each.value].location # or alternatively each.value
  resource_group_name = azurerm_resource_group.rg[each.value].name


  sku {
    tier = "Standard"
    size = "S1"
  }
}

resource "azurerm_app_service" "app" {
  for_each            = toset(var.location)
  name                = "${each.value}-${var.app_service}"
  resource_group_name = azurerm_resource_group.rg[each.value].name
  location            = azurerm_resource_group.rg[each.value].location # or alternatively each.value
  app_service_plan_id = azurerm_app_service_plan.plan[each.value].id
  https_only          = true

  site_config {
    dotnet_framework_version = "v4.0"
    always_on                = true
    ftps_state               = "Disabled"
    min_tls_version          = "1.2"
  }

  tags = {
    environment = var.environment
    source      = "terraform"
  }
}

Note that I am using toset [2] here to convert the list to a set in order to be able to use for_each on it. Also I am using the values to make names of resources across regions more distinguishable, ie, appending each.value to the variables you want to use for names.

---

[1] https://www.terraform.io/language/meta-arguments/for_each

[2] https://www.terraform.io/language/functions/toset