What is FTAC?

FTAC, the Fabric Terraform Actions Compiler, turns a *-pipeline.yaml written in GitHub Actions vocabulary into the pipeline-content.json that the microsoft/fabric Terraform provider expects for a Microsoft Fabric data pipeline.

Why

A Fabric pipeline is a few hundred lines of nested JSON with SQL and ADF expressions buried inside string literals. Reviewing a change in Git means diffing that JSON.

FTAC generates that JSON from sources you can actually read:

• SQL stays SQL.
• Expressions are ${{ }} with inputs, vars, env and steps.x.outputs.
• The activity graph is a list of steps with needs.

The generated JSON is committed next to its source. A check target verifies it is in sync, so CI fails when someone edits the JSON by hand or forgets to rebuild.

What a pipeline looks like

name: Hello_Pipeline
output: hello.json
inputs:
  date: { type: string, default: '' }
vars:
  date: String
env:
  POSTGRES: 00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000
datasets:
  out:
    csv: { lakehouse: brz_lakehouse, folder: Hello, file: hello.csv }
steps:
  - id: set_date
    uses: fabric/set-variable
    with: { name: date, value: "${{ if(empty(inputs.date), formatDateTime(utcNow(), 'yyyy-MM-dd'), inputs.date) }}" }
  - id: load
    needs: set_date
    uses: fabric/copy
    with:
      source:
        postgres:
          connection: ${{ env.POSTGRES }}
          query: SELECT 1 AS one WHERE ${{ sql(vars.date) }}::date <= CURRENT_DATE
      sink:
        csv: out

Each uses: names a built-in action. Each action page shows its inputs, an example, and the Fabric JSON the example compiles to.