Time to live of a item in dynamodb

Question

I am playing with amazon dynamodb no-sql database from past few days and wondering that if there is any feature time to live (TTL) of a item, so that when item reached at that value it automatically deleted from table as per the TTL value, instead of doing manually batch delete item.

ManJan · Answer 1 · 2017-11-17T01:09:03.433

30

Yes, Amazon released the time to live (TTL) feature to DynamoDb in Feb 2017. You just have to go to DynamoDb on your console. Select your table. Then click Overview and enable it there.

The TTL attribute should be your column/attribute that would decide when the row should be expired/deleted.

NOTE: The ttl attribute should be of number datatype(because DynamoDb doesn't support datetime data type). So it should be in EPOCH time format.

For example:
- Linux Terminal: date +%s
- Python: import time; long(time.time())
- Java: System.currentTimeMillis() / 1000L
- JavaScript: Math.floor(Date.now() / 1000)

edited Nov 17 '17 at 01:09

answered Mar 03 '17 at 21:07

ManJan

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Any ideas how to do this in java? – PUG Mar 28 '17 at 20:23
@Hassan : Use System.currentTimeMillis() / 1000L to populate the column that is a TTL attribute. – ManJan Mar 29 '17 at 21:40
Interesting... What if I put TTL in future? Say (java) `Instant.now().plus(28l, ChronoUnit.DAYS).getEpochSecond() / 1000` - will it delete items in 30 days (28 + 2 from dynamodb spec)? Or I am wrong – Cherry Jun 14 '18 at 08:46
Question. Does DynamoDB extend TTL after reads on an object during said TTL? – papaya Nov 19 '18 at 07:02
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@SiddarthSreeni, no, Dynamo doesn't change the contents of that key. – ur-vogel Apr 24 '19 at 21:23
For java this can be followed. https://stackoverflow.com/a/24703573 – fozersahin Apr 06 '21 at 15:55

score 7 · Answer 2 · edited Dec 05 '18 at 01:40

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EDIT: AWS released DynamoDb TTL feature in Feb 2017.

Unfortunately, the answer is pretty short: No

As a matter of fact, DynamoDB has been designed from the ground up for simplicity. No fancy features.

edited Dec 05 '18 at 01:40

ManJan

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answered Nov 12 '12 at 14:15

yadutaf

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You know what's funny? "TTL" is a reserved word in DynamoDB. – Tom Nov 21 '15 at 19:32
I heard this year they are coming up with experimental TTL – Neil Jul 15 '16 at 10:58
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@SoulMan did they add it? – Thomas Aug 15 '16 at 08:52
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TTL support has been released so this is no longer the correct answer. – JaredHatfield Mar 05 '17 at 14:04

score 0 · Answer 3 · answered Feb 28 '17 at 06:05

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Yes, They have recently released this feature. Go through the documentation below https://aws.amazon.com/about-aws/whats-new/2017/02/amazon-dynamodb-now-supports-automatic-item-expiration-with-time-to-live-ttl/

answered Feb 28 '17 at 06:05

siya

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Add some description here too, as the link you provided may not always work. – VPK Feb 28 '17 at 06:25

score 0 · Answer 4 · answered Apr 05 '19 at 10:01

You can do it using AWS DynamoDB console like what is stated by Manjan's answer.

If you prefer to use a command, you can also use AWS DynamoDB CLI command:

aws dynamodb update-time-to-live
--table-name demoTable
--time-to-live-specification Enabled=true,AttributeName=ttl

You can check out this article for more information.

Time to live of a item in dynamodb

4 Answers4