Why is Terraform import silently failing?

Question

I'm trying to import an AWS RDS db instance. The import reports as successful, but my state is unchanged.

I started this process using Terraform 0.14.1 and was getting verbose errors on import (Error: Cannot import non-existent remote object). After I updated to Terraform 0.15.1 (via homebrew on MacOS) the import now reports as successful, but is does not actually update the state. Also, I can “successfully” run the import over and over without error, underscoring how the import is not actually updating the state.

Is this a bug in Terraform, or a problem on my end with my process or config?

$ terraform import aws_db_instance.fuse-db <ID>
aws_db_instance.fuse-db: Importing from ID "<ID>"...
aws_db_instance.fuse-db: Import prepared!
  Prepared aws_db_instance for import
aws_db_instance.fuse-db: Refreshing state... [id=<ID>]

Import successful!

The resources that were imported are shown above. These resources are now in
your Terraform state and will henceforth be managed by Terraform.

$ terraform state show aws_db_instance.fuse-db
No instance found for the given address!

This command requires that the address references one specific instance.
To view the available instances, use "terraform state list". Please modify
the address to reference a specific instance.
$ terraform -v
Terraform v0.15.1
on darwin_amd64
+ provider registry.terraform.io/hashicorp/aws v3.38.0

selfsimilar selfsimilar · Accepted Answer · 2021-05-03T01:49:58

I was able to successfully import the resource using the aws_db_instance.id value which in AWS is known as the 'DB identifier'. I had been trying to use the aws_db_instance.resource_id value which is the value type used by most other resources I’ve imported.

Why is Terraform import silently failing?

1 Answers