Apply

Overview

Terraform’s apply prompt says “Do you want to perform these actions?” with no context — the same prompt whether you’re creating 1 resource or deleting 50. You type “yes” based on faith, not understanding.

The Apply screen adds:

• Context-aware confirmation — shows resource count and whether targeting is active
• Elapsed time tracking — long applies (10+ minutes) need progress feedback
• Pin-scoped execution — apply only pinned resources without typing -target addresses
• Error recovery — retry from same session without re-running the full command

Screenshot

Interactive (TUI)

Entry Points

• From Plan: Press a after reviewing changes. If resources are pinned, apply targets only those.
• From Home: Press a directly. Shows idle state until you confirm.

Keybindings

Key	Action	Context
Enter	Start apply (shows confirmation)	Idle
y / Y / Enter	Confirm and execute	Confirming
n / N / Esc	Cancel	Confirming
r	Retry after failure	Error
Esc / q	Back to home	Always

Enter/Esc parity: Enter confirms (yes), Esc cancels (no).

Flow

Plan ──a──→ Apply (no targets → confirming)
Plan ──a──→ Apply (with targets → replanning → confirming)
Plan ──A──→ Apply (auto-approve: skip confirmation)
               │
               ├── y → Apply (running) → Apply (success)
               │                       → Apply (error) ──r──→ retry
               └── n/Esc → DeactivateMsg → return to plan

Replan for Targeted Apply

When pinned resources exist, apply does NOT use the saved plan file directly (terraform constraint). Instead it replans with -target flags to produce a targeted plan, shows it for review, then applies that plan file. This ensures the user always reviews exactly what will be applied.

Command Line (CLI)

# Default: plan first, then apply (with progress)
tfui plan -project ./infra
tfui apply -project ./infra

# Auto-approve: skip confirmation (required for non-interactive apply)
tfui apply -project ./infra -auto-approve

# Silent: no animation. Mirrors terraform — non-interactive apply without a
# plan file requires -auto-approve, else "Apply not allowed for non-interactive
# use" (exit 1), exactly as `terraform apply` behaves with no TTY.
tfui apply -project ./infra -ci -auto-approve

# NDJSON events (terraform-compatible)
tfui apply -project ./infra -json

# Targeted: apply only specific resources
tfui plan -project ./infra -target aws_instance.web
tfui apply -project ./infra

# With chdir (monorepo)
tfui apply -project ./infra -chdir modules/networking

Output Examples

Silent mode:

Apply complete.

Agent mode (JSON):

{
  "status": "complete"
}

Exit Codes

Code	Meaning
0	Apply succeeded
1	Apply failed (terraform error, no plan file, etc.)

Targeting

CLI: Pass -target to the plan command. The saved plan file already contains only targeted changes. Apply then applies that plan.

TUI: Pin resources with Space in the Plan view. When you press a, tfui re-plans with only pinned resources as targets, then applies that targeted plan.

Key insight: You don’t pass -target to apply. Targeting happens at plan time — apply always executes the saved plan file exactly.

Equivalence

Goal	CLI	TUI
Apply all changes	tfui plan && tfui apply	p → a → y
Apply specific resources	tfui plan -target X && tfui apply	p → pin X → a → y
Check apply result	Exit code + stdout	Success/error screen

Configuration

# tfui.hcl
plugin "apply" {
  enabled = true
  targets = ["module.networking"]
}

Option	Type	Default	Description
enabled	bool	true	Enable/disable the plugin
targets	list	[]	Default resource targets (used when no pins active)

Related

• Plan – review changes before applying
• Risk Analysis – assess risk before applying