Community & Contribution Guide

Relevant source files

The following files were used as context for generating this wiki page:

• CONTRIBUTING.md
• COMMUNITY.md
• README.md
• CLAUDE.md
• sea-orm-sync/CLAUDE.md

SeaORM is a community-driven Object-Relational Mapper (ORM) for the Rust ecosystem. This guide outlines the various ways individuals can participate in the project, ranging from technical code contributions and documentation to community support and financial sponsorship. The project operates under the SeaQL organization and maintains a clear set of guidelines for development and interaction to ensure a productive environment for all contributors.
Sources: CONTRIBUTING.md:5-7, README.md:435-438

The project is governed by the SeaQL Code of Conduct, which all participants are expected to uphold. SeaORM encourages participation through multiple channels, including Discord for real-time chat, GitHub Discussions for long-form questions, and GitHub Issues for feature requests and bug reporting.
Sources: CONTRIBUTING.md:9-15, README.md:40-42

Contribution Pathways

Contributors can engage with SeaORM through several distinct roles and activities. The project specifically looks for long-term contributors who may eventually receive "grants" for their devotion, although the organization currently operates with limited resources for stable income.
Sources: CONTRIBUTING.md:33-38

Types of Support

• General Support: Recommending the project, writing blog posts/tutorials, and helping users in the community.
• Feature Requests: Proposed features are welcomed and implemented if they benefit the wider user base; however, direct code contributions are preferred.
• Sponsorship: Financial contributions via GitHub Sponsors to help sustain the independent open-source organization.
• Code Contribution: Submitting Pull Requests (PRs) for bug fixes, performance improvements, or new features.
  Sources: CONTRIBUTING.md:17-31, README.md:470-474

Development Environment Setup

To contribute code, developers must set up a local environment capable of running the SeaORM test suite. The project utilizes a workspace-based Rust structure, and testing is divided into unit tests and live integration tests.
Sources: CONTRIBUTING.md:42-45

Testing Infrastructure

Unit tests do not require a live database and can be executed via Cargo. Integration tests require live database instances, which are typically managed via Docker.
Sources: CONTRIBUTING.md:47-64

Test Category	Target Component	Command
Unit Test	Core workspace (sea-orm, macros, codegen)	cargo test --workspace
Unit Test	CLI tool (sea-orm-cli)	cargo test --manifest-path sea-orm-cli/Cargo.toml
Unit Test	Rocket integration	cargo test --manifest-path sea-orm-rocket/Cargo.toml
Integration	SQLite (In-Memory)	DATABASE_URL="sqlite::memory:" cargo test --all --features ...
Integration	MySQL	DATABASE_URL="mysql://root:root@localhost" cargo test --all --features ...
Integration	PostgreSQL	DATABASE_URL="postgres://root:root@localhost" cargo test --all --features ...
Sources: CONTRIBUTING.md:49-75

Code Standards and Tooling

The project enforces specific formatting and linting rules:

• TOML Formatting: Handled by taplo-cli using taplo fmt --check.
• Sync Generation: The sea-orm-sync crate is auto-generated from the root src/ using build-tools/make-sync.sh. Contributors should never edit files in sea-orm-sync/src/ directly.
• Linting: Denies missing_debug_implementations, clippy::unwrap_used, and clippy::print_stdout.
  Sources: CONTRIBUTING.md:104-110, sea-orm-sync/CLAUDE.md:3-13, src/lib.rs:4-11

Development Workflow for Sync Crate

Because sea-orm-sync provides a synchronous API by stripping async/await from the main source, the workflow for contributing to synchronous features follows a strict transformation process.
Sources: sea-orm-sync/CLAUDE.md:1-13

Sync Transformation Logic

The transformation process utilizes sed scripts to perform the following operations:

• Strip async and await keywords.
• Remove #[async_trait] attributes.
• Replace asynchronous primitives (e.g., futures_util::lock::Mutex) with synchronous ones (std::sync::Mutex).
  Sources: sea-orm-sync/CLAUDE.md:10-13

The diagram above illustrates how changes in the root source directory propagate to the synchronous crate through automated transformation scripts.
Sources: sea-orm-sync/CLAUDE.md:3-16

Community Ecosystem

The SeaORM community maintains an extensive list of software "Built with SeaORM," categorized by industry and use case.
Sources: COMMUNITY.md:1-5

Project Showcase Categories

• Startups: Includes high-profile tools like Zed (multiplayer code editor), RisingWave (stream processing), and Svix (webhooks).
• Open Source Projects: Spans CMS (Backpack, Ryot), Game backends (KongYing Tavern), and System tools (LLDAP).
• Frameworks: Integration with higher-level frameworks like Loco.rs, spring-rs, and tardis.
• Programming Libraries: Tooling built on top of SeaORM, such as sea-orm-adapter for Casbin.
  Sources: COMMUNITY.md:7-133

Learning Resources

The community provides various educational materials:

• Video Courses: Axum and SeaORM playlists by Brooks Builds.
• Articles: Multi-part series on Async GraphQL with Rust by Brandon Konkle.
  Sources: COMMUNITY.md:162-168

Technical Contribution Guidelines (SeaORM 2.0)

When contributing code, developers must follow the SeaORM 2.0 patterns, as they differ significantly from the 1.0 architecture often found in older training data.
Sources: CLAUDE.md:3-7

Key 2.0 Patterns

1. Entity Format: Use #[sea_orm::model] with relations defined directly on the Model struct instead of separate enums.
2. Typed Columns: Use the COLUMN constant for compile-time type safety (e.g., user::COLUMN.name.contains("Bob")).
3. ActiveModel Builder: Utilize the fluent builder API for nested persistence.
4. Trait Imports: Ensure sea_orm::ExprTrait is imported when using methods like .eq() or .contains() on Expr.
   Sources: CLAUDE.md:10-25, CLAUDE.md:65-70, CLAUDE.md:95-97

Common Anti-Patterns to Avoid

• Redundant Annotations: Do not specify column_type on custom types using DeriveValueType.
• String Truncation: Use Text or StringLen::Max for MySQL/MSSQL strings that may exceed 255 characters.
• Manual Implementations: Do not manually implement traits that DeriveValueType now auto-generates (e.g., IntoActiveValue).
  Sources: CLAUDE.md:112-140

Summary: SeaORM relies on a collaborative ecosystem where technical contributions are guided by strict 2.0 architectural patterns and automated sync processes, while community growth is fostered through showcase projects and diverse support channels.
Sources: README.md:435-438, CLAUDE.md:3-5