In general, I tend to prefer straight SQL, but for a project I expect to maintain over time, I like having an orm. To go further, I like to write and maintain

In general, I tend to prefer straight SQL, but for a project I expect to maintain over time, I like having an orm. To go further, I like to write and maintain my own orm(s), that auto-generate the classes and functions that I'll be using. This is mostly for making sure my code is up to date with the database. A migration _requires_ a code-change due to the orm code-gen and thus i can't deploy the migration until I ensure my codebase is ready for it Overall, I would much prefer native SQL support in whatever language I'm working in. But a light ORM tends not to be a terrible trade-off. Also I like this style of orm because sometimes the order of definining SQL is annoying to me. I prefer to start with the "from" and the joins, then add the conditions, and finally, the columns, which likely reference the other parts and thus make more sense at the end.