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I am currently using mySQL LOAD DATA INFILE to insert a csv file into my database. This csv file is downloaded to the server on a daily basis in order to keep product data up-to-date.

What I want to know is how can I update the table with the new csv and preserve the existing data where it's not different?

Here is my current statement:

LOAD DATA LOCAL INFILE '$file' REPLACE INTO TABLE products FIELDS TERMINATED BY ',' ENCLOSED BY '\"' ESCAPED BY '\\\' IGNORE 1 LINES (aw_product_id,merchant_id,merchant_image_url,aw_deep_link,description,in_stock,merchant_name,brand_name,display_price,product_name,rrp_price,merchant_category

This works fine but it replaces the ID column with a completely new set and also reverts columns that I want to ignore, back to the default state. For example I have a column called 'Published' with a value of 0 or 1. If I use REPLACE it sets that column back to 0.

How can I use REPLACE but ignore some columns?

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The answer to How can I use REPLACE but ignore some columns? is you can't: REPLACE allways replaces a complete row, not the single field values of that row.

The answer to Can I still achieve my goal though is Yes: My recommendation would be to LOAD DATA LOCAL INFILE into another table, then use a stored procedure or query to INSERT and UPDATE (as opposed to REPLACE) your main table. If you give us a bit more information (table structure, which column matches the loaded data with the existing data) we might be able to help you further.

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Thank you for confirming my suspicion! –  veeTrain Aug 30 '13 at 14:32
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