Track Export Status - Amazon SimpleDB
Export Status ValuesAmazon S3 File Structure During ExportUnderstanding exportDataCutoffTime

Track Export Status

After starting an export, you can track its progress using the get-export command with the export ARN returned by start-domain-export: 

aws simpledbv2 get-export \
		    --export-arn 'arn:aws::sdb:us-east-1:111122223333:domain/myDomain/export/3eb4eaed-872b-4e08-b4b6-ff6999a83e01'

The command returns detailed information about the export as shown in the following example: 

{
		    "exportArn": "arn:aws::sdb:us-east-1:111122223333:domain/myDomain/export/3eb4eaed-872b-4e08-b4b6-ff6999a83e01",
		    "clientToken": "ad9ac782-954a-45d1-8d47-8ef843c0ffe2",
		    "exportStatus": "IN_PROGRESS",
		    "domainName": "myDomain",
		    "requestedAt": "2025-06-03T10:05:47.757000+00:00",
		    "s3Bucket": "my-export-bucket",
		    "s3BucketOwner": "111122223333",
		    "exportDataCutoffTime": "2025-06-03T10:05:47.757000+00:00"
		}

Export Status Values

The exportStatus field indicates the current state of the export:

PENDING

The export request has been received and is queued for processing.

IN_PROGRESS

The export is actively being processed and data is being written to Amazon S3.

SUCCEEDED

The export completed successfully and all data has been written to Amazon S3.

FAILED

The export encountered an error. The response includes failureCode and failureMessage fields with details about the failure.

Amazon S3 File Structure During Export

As the export progresses, Amazon SimpleDB writes files to your Amazon S3 bucket in the following order:

  1. An empty _started file is created first to verify that the bucket is writable.

  2. Data files are written to the data/ directory with names in the format dataFile<randomPartitionIds>.json.

  3. When the export completes successfully, manifest files (manifest-file.json and manifest-summary.json) are written to the export directory.

Understanding exportDataCutoffTime

The exportDataCutoffTime field indicates the timestamp used to determine which data is included in the export. It is important to understand that Amazon SimpleDB exports are not point-in-time snapshots.

  • All items inserted before this timestamp are included in the export.

  • Items inserted after this timestamp are not included in the export.

  • For existing items, updates or deletions that occur after the cutoff time may not be reflected in the exported data.

  • The timestamp represents when domain processing begins, not when the export request was received.

If you perform multiple exports over time, you may need to implement deduplication logic when processing the exported data to handle items that appear in multiple exports.