find in parent folders

Terragrunt’s built-in function find_in_parent_folders enables recursive searches up your directory tree to locate a specific file or folder. This approach is invaluable when you need to reference shared configurations or modules in a multi-layered project, removing the brittleness of hardcoded relative paths.

Why Use find_in_parent_folders?

By leveraging this function, you can:

• Dynamically adapt configuration based on files located higher in the hierarchy
• Inherit and override settings across environments without manual path tweaks
• Maintain cleaner, DRY (Don’t Repeat Yourself) configurations

Best Practices

• Organize projects into clear, modular, hierarchical folders
• Use find_in_parent_folders inside include blocks to locate root-level terragrunt.hcl
• Avoid embedding static paths; let Terragrunt resolve them dynamically

Real-World Example

Imagine a VPC module that relies on common variables from common.hcl.

Before (hardcoded path):

terraform {
  source = "tfr://terraform-aws-modules/vpc/aws//?version=5.8.1"
}

locals {
  common_vars = read_terragrunt_config("../common.hcl")
}

inputs = {
  name = "${local.common_vars.inputs.project}-${local.common_vars.inputs.environment}-VPC"
}

After (dynamic lookup):

terraform {
  source = "tfr://terraform-aws-modules/vpc/aws//?version=5.8.1"
}

locals {
  common_vars = read_terragrunt_config(find_in_parent_folders("common.hcl"))
}

inputs = {
  name = "${local.common_vars.inputs.project}-${local.common_vars.inputs.environment}-VPC"
}

Now, no matter how deep your vpc/ folder is nested, Terragrunt will climb up until it finds common.hcl.

Verify with Terragrunt

Run:

~/workspace/vpc
> terragrunt plan

You should see the VPC name generated using values from common.hcl, for example:

KodeKloudDevVPC

common.hcl

inputs = {
  project     = "KodeKloud"
  environment = "dev"
}

References

• Terragrunt Documentation: find_in_parent_folders
• Terragrunt Official Site