An alternative utility to nodetool snapshot to export whole Apache Cassandra keyspace/table structure and data to Cassandra Query Language (CQL) scripts. CQL scripts is a lightweight,simple way to restore and backup databases.

Features:

• simple and configurable, see usage for detail.
• fast and highly scalable: Data is exported gradually, so memory usage is very low, e.g: for my keyspace with 1,5 million record took ~3m to generated.
• export process is tracked with detail information.
• CQL scripts is ready to import using SOURCE command.
• tested with Cassandra > 2.1, 2.2, 3.0 and tick-tock releases.
• require Java > 6., make sure Java is available in PATH variable.

Overcome nodetool snapshot caveats:

• snapshot can only be restored when table schema is there --> cassandra-CQL-exporter support both DDL and DML backup.
• snapshot can only run on a node, multiple node require parallel ssh to be setup --> cassandra-CQL-exporter dont need to care there is how many node.
• snapshot is stored the node itself, cassandra-CQL-exporter back up is stored on the backup client itself --> more isolated backup environment.

Generated script contains 2 component:

• DDL: include keyspace CREATE statement, all tables, indexs, materialized views, function, aggregate function, user defined type.
• DML: INSERT statement for tables data.

Be careful that script will be forward-compatible but not guarantee to be backward-compatible especially DDL statements. It's better that export and import using same Cassandra version. I'm using this on a daily basis. But anyways, use this at YOUR OWN RISK!

usage: cql-export [--drop] [-f <file name>] [-fo] [-h <host>] [--help] [-k <keyspace>] [-l] [-m] [--noddl] [--nodml] [-p <password>] [-po <port>] [-s] [-t <table>] [--test] [--truncate] [-u <username>] [-v] [--secure] --drop add DROP KEYSPACE statement. BE CAREFUL! THIS WILL WIPED OUT ENTIRE KEYSPACE -f,--file <file name> exported file path. default to "<keyspace>.CQL" or "<keyspace>.<table>.CQL" -fo,--force force overwrite of existing file -h,--host <host> server host name or IP of database server, default is "localhost" --help print this help message -k,--keyspace <keyspace> database keyspace to be exported. or <keyspace1,keyspace2> It allows to specify multiple keyspaces separated with comma. e.g. -k keyspace1,keyspace2 -kf,--keyspacesFile Allows to specify file which contains keyspaces you'd like to export, separated by new line -l,--license Print this software license -m,--merge merge table data, insert will be generated with "IF NOT EXISTS" --noddl don't generate DDL statements (CREATE TABLE, INDEX, MATERIALIZED VIEW, TYPE, TRIGGER, AGGREGATE), mutual exclusive with "nodml" option --nodml don't generate DML statements (INSERT), mutual exclusive with "noddl" option -p,--pass <password> database password -po,--port <port> database server port, default is 9042 -s,--separate seperated export by tables -t,--table <table> keyspace table to be exported --test Enable test mode. for development testing only --truncate add TRUNCATE TABLE statement. BE CAREFUL! -u,--user <username> database username -v,--verbose print verbose message --secure connect via SSL, -Djavax.net.ssl.trustStore=... -Djavax.net.ssl.trustStorePassword=... must be added to JAVA_OPTS environment variable 

##Sample usage

1. Simplest usages; only keyspace needed with localhost server and default port

    $cql-export -k cycling Trying connect to host "localhost" Success! Trying connect to port "9042" Success! Trying connect to keyspace "cycling" Success! All good! Start exporting... Write DDL to C:\cql-generator\cycling.CQL Extract from cycling.cyclist_races Total number of record: 117920 Start write "cyclist_teams" data DML to C:\cql-generator\cycling.CQL Done 5.00% Done 30.00% Done 90.00% Done exporting "cyclist_teams", total number of records exported: 117920 Export completed after 21.179 s! Exited. 

2. Simple usage:

$cql-export -h localhost-po 9043 -k cycling 

3. Generate only DDL statement

$cql-export -h localhost-po 9043 -k keyspace_name -noddl 

TODO: optimized jar size.

Apache 2.0 License

./gradlew 

or (Windows:)

gradlew.bat 

./gradlew jar 

or (Windows:)

gradlew.bat jar 

this places the jar file into the "dist" folder

version 1.1 with gradle script and possibility to specify multiple keyspaces to export contributed by matto3c https://www.codegravity.com