Welcome

Introduction to SeaORM and Setup: A Guide to Getting Started with SeaORM in Rust

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by

Uktamjon
in

1. What is SeaORM?

SeaORM is a powerful, asynchronous, and type-safe Object Relational Mapper (ORM) designed for Rust. It enables developers to interact with databases using Rust’s powerful type system while maintaining performance and scalability. SeaORM is especially valuable for web and backend developers in Rust who are familiar with similar ORMs in other languages, such as Django ORM (Python), SQLAlchemy (Python), or ActiveRecord (Ruby).

SeaORM stands out in a few key areas when compared to other popular ORMs:

  • Django ORM (Python): Django ORM focuses on tight integration with the Django web framework. It provides a simple, high-level API but lacks the deep type safety and performance guarantees that Rust provides. SeaORM, while not tied to a web framework, emphasizes type safety and concurrency.
  • SQLAlchemy (Python): SQLAlchemy is known for its flexibility and ability to work in both ORM and SQL expression modes. SeaORM offers a simpler experience for CRUD operations and avoids some of the complexities associated with SQLAlchemy’s ORM, but it doesn’t have SQLAlchemy’s hybrid ORM/SQL expression flexibility.
  • ActiveRecord (Ruby): Like Django ORM, ActiveRecord is tightly coupled with Ruby on Rails. It focuses on simplicity and convention over configuration. SeaORM is more explicit, leveraging Rust’s strictness to avoid errors at compile-time, whereas ActiveRecord may allow more runtime errors.

When and Why You Should Use SeaORM

You should consider using SeaORM if:

  • You are looking for a type-safe, query-builder-like experience when managing your database records.
  • You are building an application in Rust that needs database interaction.
  • You want a fully asynchronous ORM that supports non-blocking database interactions.
  • You value the safety and performance guarantees of Rust while working with databases.

2. Setting Up SeaORM in a Rust Project

To begin using SeaORM, you first need to have Rust and Cargo installed. If you haven’t installed Rust, you can do so using the following command:

curl --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 -sSf https://sh.rustup.rs | sh

Once Rust is installed, you can create a new project and add SeaORM as a dependency.

Step 1: Create a New Rust Project






cargo new seaorm_demo
cd seaorm_demo





Step 2: Add Dependencies in Cargo.toml





Open your Cargo.toml file and add the following dependencies for SeaORM and the database you intend to use (e.g., SQLite, PostgreSQL, MySQL).





[dependencies]
sea-orm = { version = "0.11", features = ["sqlx-sqlite", "runtime-tokio-native-tls"] }
tokio = { version = "1", features = ["full"] }
sqlx = { version = "0.6", features = ["sqlite", "runtime-tokio-native-tls"] }





Step 3: Install the Required SQL Database Driver





SeaORM supports various databases. Depending on your database choice, you’ll need to install the corresponding SQL driver. For SQLite, it is already included in the features above. If you are using PostgreSQL or MySQL, you can replace the sqlx-sqlite feature with sqlx-postgres or sqlx-mysql.