Why the "server" block instead of using provider authentication?

[karlschriek]

I was wondering what the reasoning is for logging into the SQL Server via the "server" block within the resource specs? This is the first time that I have seen a terraform provider do it like this and was wondering if there is a specific reason for this.

To be clear what I mean, instead of passing the authentication information via the resource itself, I would have expected to instead initialise the provider with it, thereby establishing a session that is used by all resources thereafter. I.e., something that looks like this:

terraform {
  required_providers {
    mssql = {
      source  = "betr-io/mssql"
      version = "0.2.5"
    }
  }
}

provider "mssql" {
  host = "example-sql-server.database.windows.net"
  azure_login {
    tenant_id     = "xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx"
    client_id     = "xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx"
    client_secret = "terriblySecretSecret"
  }
}

resource "mssql_login" "example" {
  login_name = "testlogin"
  password = "verysecret"
}

resource "mssql_login" "example2" {
  login_name = "testlogin2"
  password = "veryverysecret"
}