/tags/software-engineering/Recent content in Software Engineering on ./hackandsla.shHugoenThu, 19 Feb 2026 15:15:57 -0500/posts/2026-02-19-plan-apply-pattern/Thu, 19 Feb 2026 00:00:00 +0000/posts/2026-02-19-plan-apply-pattern/<h1 id="the-plan-apply-pattern">The Plan-Apply Pattern</h1> <p>My favorite way to supercharge nearly any administrative script is the <strong>Plan-Apply Pattern</strong>. Instead of directly mutating infrastructure, you split up your script into two logical steps:</p> <ul> <li><strong>Plan</strong> - Gather the info about what you want to modify, figure out how you need to modify it, and create an object representing each operation you want to perform</li> <li><strong>Apply</strong> - Take the object generated from the plan, and apply it</li> </ul> <p>This is especially helpful for scripts that modify or delete infrastructure. Tools like Terraform do this automatically, but I often have to roll my own scripts for things like bulk cleanup or modification.</p>