How can I exclude data for certain tables but keep structure with mysqldump?

Question

I'm doing a regular dump of a database that uses the database for logging. I need to create a mysqldump command that dumps everything from the database but excludes the row information for the log tables.

I see the no-data parameter, but that doesn't seem to support selecting only certain tables.

Answer 1

you can combine with shell script to help better

#/bin/bash

# dump all except for table log
tables=$(mysql -N <<< "show tables from your_db" | grep -Ev "^log$" | xargs); 
mysqldump your_db $tables > backup.sql

# dump structure for table log
mysqldump -d your_db log >> backup.sql

Answer 2

Run 2 commands. One where you list all tables that you want a full dump of, one where you dump only the table definition

#structure only
mysqldump -d -q mydb table1 table2 table3

#all data too
mysqldump -q mydb table4 table5 table6