What is the use of the terraform output command?

The terraform output command is specifically designed to retrieve outputs that have been defined in your Terraform configuration. Outputs are a way to extract certain values from your Terraform state, making them easily accessible after running terraform apply. They can include important information such as IP addresses, resource IDs, or any other data that you want to be highlighted or passed to other configurations.

When you define outputs in your Terraform configuration file—using the output block—you can access these outputs later through the terraform output command. This can be particularly useful when you want to pass information to other Terraform configurations or when you're working with multiple modules that require certain values from one another.

The command does not display the state of resources directly, show full resource configurations, or summarize changes made during deployments, which distinguishes its purpose and functionality from the other options.