Question

How can I overwrite an item and replace all its attributes.

For eg., I have an item A, with following attributes

ItemA

AttrA = ValueA

AttrB = ValueB

now I want to update ItemA with the following attributes

ItemA(Updated)

AttrB = ValueB1

AttrC = ValueC

I am using the Java SDK. I don’t want to delete the item and then create it. Currently, I am using BatchPutAttributesRequest to re-create the item but surprisingly, it doesn’t delete the attributes that are not present in the updated item.

So I end up with the Item

ItemA

AttrA = ValueA

AttrB = ValueB1

AttrC = ValueC

Answer 1

BatchPutAttributesRequest request does not delete existing Attribute that you had not included in your request. You need to send an another request DeleteAttributesRequest to Amazon SimpleDB by specifying list of Attributes that you wish to delete. BatchPutAttributesRequest can only add new Attribute or can update existing value of an attribute.