Maestro and BSL 1.1 license for HashiCorp Terraform

The news that HashiCorp switches its Terraform license from the Mozilla open source Mozilla Public License (MPL) v2. 0 to Business Source License stirred up the technical society across the globe.

It’s no wonder, as Terraform has become an integral part of numerous businesses ecosystems and infrastructures, and the BSL license restricts using Terraform for creating commercial products, unless a separate agreement is mage.

Terraform is also an important part of Maestro Infrastructure as Code engine, and it’s high time to clarify: how does the new Terraform Licensing affect Maestro customers.

 

What is BSL 1.1 License for Terraform?

You can find the full license text  and the detailed FAQ on the official HashiCorp website, However, here is a brief summary:

• You can use Terraform for free for non-commercial (internal and personal) usage and need an additional agreement for production usage.
• For integration partners that build integrations with HashiCorp products, including Terraform providers, Vault plugins, and other product integrations, there is no change.
• Commercial customers of HashiCorp will see no change. 
• Organizations providing competitive offerings to HashiCorp will no longer be permitted to use the community edition products free of charge under the new BSL license.
• The Terraform versions provided under the original MPL 2.0 license can still be used under this license.

Having this in mind, let’s look at Maestro’s integration with Terraform.

 

Maestro IaC Engine & the Terraform BSL 1.1 License

Maestro architecture is based on API-first approach which makes it integration friendly and allows us to build and evolve the product by connecting different engines and components – own, third-party, commercial and open source. And it also makes Maestro adjustable to  components licensing changes.

To align this idea with the HashiCorp’s BSL 1.1, let’s match Maestro with the key points.

·        Maestro Terraform engine not provided on a commercial basis.

Maestro IaC offering, with Terraform as a part of it, is going open source. Being a non-commercial offering, it does not compete with Hashicorp, and is offered to Maestro users as an extra function. Thus, can be freely used.

If the customer’s end users switch to a paid version of TF, HashiCorp has no claims against the open sourced tool provider.

·        Maestro uses an MPL – licensed Terraform version out of the box

HashiCorp clarifies that the Terraform versions delivered before the BSL license introduction, are still delivered as MPL, or open source, ones.

Maestro adds Terraform 1.5.5, the latest open source version, to its library, so that the users can benefit with.

·        Terraform-related functionality was created before the BSL license introduction and can be used with the open source terms.

Terraform engine, which includes not only the templates processing, but also cost estimations, lock functionality, approvals, stacks lifecycle management, was introduced far before the licensing change in HashiCorp, for which there are numerous proofs in articles and documentation.

According to HashiCorp’s explanations, if any feature created by them becomes competitive to an already existing solution, this solution does not get affected by the BSL license.

·        Maestro Terraform Provider is not subject to BSL

As any other provider, created by third parties, Maestro team can select the licensing for the Maestro Terraform Provider. As was mentioned before, it will be open sourced in the nearest future.

Thus, using Maestro in an out-of-the-box build, you don’t need to worry about using Terraform. Still, please note that in case you would like to commercially use the Terraform versions that are subject to the BSL license, you take the responsibility for arranging a proper agreement with HashiCorp.

Maestro plans to integrate OpenTofu

OpenTofu, an open-source community-driven fork of Terraform, managed by the Linux Foundation, is considered an effective alternative to the HashiCorp Terraform under BSL 1.1.

Naturally, Maestro put the integration to its nearest roadmap to offer the wider range of possibilities to its users. Keep track of the updates! 

Bonus: Facilitating Transition from Terraform with Maestro

Naturally, with the introduction of the BSL 1.1 license, you may consider migrating from Terraform to another Infrastructure as Code tool.

In Maestro, Terraform is only a part of the IaC offering. It also includes the support for the AWS CloudFormation and Azure Bicep services. Thus, Maestro can be a perfect background for transition to the native services, as it allows creating new templates, testing them, checking the performance while keeping the currently used ones – all within the same toolset.

The times change the reality, and this is also true for the techno world. This time, Maestro can be one of the anchors in this storm, ensuring the stability and smoothness of your enterprise automation.