I actually really agree that Terraform is a good analogy - you're frontloading the effort in a way that hopefully will make things easier in the future. I use

I actually really agree that Terraform is a good analogy - you're frontloading the effort in a way that hopefully will make things easier in the future. I use Terraform to manage my own personal AWS account. Recently I needed a Windows VM to run some random exe file. I could have created an EC2 instance adhoc through the web console but I did it through terraform instead. It probably took me about 30 minutes longer than it would have otherwise, but now I've got that terraform module ready to go if I ever need a windows instance again in the future. It's got a properly configured security group that only allows access from my VPN, and it outputs the IP and admin password automatically. I'll never have to solve that problem again (well, for a few years if we're being realistic).