Can't Initialize Terraform Cloud Backend - default workspace doesn't exist

[david-lawrence-tc]

I am having trouble initializing a project in atlantis that has backend configured in Terraform Cloud. Terraform Cloud does not support default workspaces, but terraform initializes with a default workspace, so I cannot seem to even initialize.

For example, in Terraform Cloud, I have workspaces named like

• my-project-dev
• my-project-stage
• my-project-prod

With backend config like

terraform {
  backend "remote" {
    hostname     = "app.terraform.io"
    organization = "org"

    workspaces {
      prefix = "my-project-"
    }
  }
}

So if I check workspaces from terraform CLI, I get

$ terraform workspace list
dev
stage
prod

Now, when I try to initialize one of these workspaces in atlantis, I cannot get initialized, even when specifying the workspace explicitly to atlantis. For example if I run

atlantis plan -w dev

I get this

running 'sh -c' '/usr/local/bin/terraform init -input=false -upgrade' in '/home/atlantis/.atlantis/repos/org/my-project/60/dev/my-project': exit status 1
Initializing the backend...

Successfully configured the backend "remote"! Terraform will automatically
use this backend unless the backend configuration changes.

╷
│ Error: Currently selected workspace "default" does not exist
│ 
│ 
╵

I tried to customize the default workflow for atlantis to first select the workspace first with

workflows:
  default:
    plan:
      steps:
        - run: terraform workspace select $WORKSPACE
        - init:
            extra_args: ["-reconfigure"]
        - plan

But this also failed with

running 'sh -c' 'terraform workspace select $WORKSPACE' in '/home/atlantis/.atlantis/repos/org/my-project/60/dev/my-project': exit status 1: running "terraform workspace select $WORKSPACE" in "/home/atlantis/.atlantis/repos/org/my-project/60/dev/my-project": 
╷
│ Error: Backend initialization required, please run "terraform init"

Besides not being able to select workspace before init, from the docs I can also see that $WORKSPACE is not set yet so this wouldn't work anyway.

So I'm stuck in a chicken/egg problem. I can't select workspace before init, and I can't init because I can't set the workspace. Any advice on how to proceed here?

[dosubot[bot]]

Hi @david-lawrence-tc! I'm Dosu and I’m helping the atlantis team.

This is a known limitation when using Atlantis with Terraform Cloud remote backend and workspace prefixes: Terraform requires backend initialization before you can select a workspace, but if there’s no "default" workspace in Terraform Cloud, terraform init fails because it tries to use "default" by default. Atlantis does not provide a way to override the initial workspace for terraform init, and custom workflows can't work around this because $WORKSPACE isn’t set before init and workspace selection can't happen before backend initialization (source).

The only reliable workaround is to ensure that each Atlantis project is explicitly configured with the correct workspace in your atlantis.yaml file, matching the workspace names in Terraform Cloud exactly (source). However, even with this, Atlantis will still attempt to run terraform init in the "default" workspace first, which will fail if it doesn't exist in Terraform Cloud.

There is currently no built-in Atlantis feature or configuration to bypass this chicken-and-egg problem. If possible, you could create a "default" workspace in Terraform Cloud as a workaround, but this may not fit all workflows. Otherwise, this is a limitation of how Terraform and Atlantis interact with remote backends using workspace prefixes (source).

To reply, just mention @dosu.

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