Is pulumi automation api same as https://github.com/hashicorp/terraform-cdk - just trying to understand the differences. In case of TF CDK it says -

The CDK for Terraform project helps users define infrastructure resources using supported programming languages and generates a Terraform configuration in JSON

But in case of Pulumi - there is no interim DSL generated right? So the infra deployment capability is provided by the lib as a feature and does not need an extra step of running the deployer i.e. to do a

pulumi up

or

terraform apply

Is pulumi automation api same as https://github.com/hashicorp/terraform-cdk

No, tfcdk is a command line tool and doesn't have a programmatic API like Automation API. Also, tfcdk just builds and runs templates. The Automation API executes your code in process, meaning that you can debug it, use your favorite frameworks, etc.

But in case of Pulumi - there is no interim DSL generated right?

This is correct, there is no intermediate with Pulumi. We execute your code directly, and that builds the cloud resource graph. Once the resource graph is built, the pulumi engine takes care of provisioning cloud resources.

So the infra deployment capability is provided by the lib as a feature and does not need an extra step of running the deployer

Yes, with Automation API you create

stack

objects, and are able to call

stack.up()

to do the deployment programmatically and get the results.