CDK for Terraform Deep Dive - The Convert Command

Ansgar Mertens and I walk through the code behind the convert command, which transforms HCL into CDKTF code. This is a code-level deep dive: we start at the entry point and trace through how the converter parses HCL, builds a graph representation, handles resources, iterators, edges, and modules, then generates the output. We also cover some of the more interesting edge cases: recursion, special case handling, and the design decisions that shaped how the converter works. If you’re interested in compiler-like problems applied to infrastructure tooling, this is the one to watch.