Dynamic Relationship Loaders¶

A key feature to enable management of a large collection is the so-called “dynamic” relationship. This is an optional form of relationship() which returns a Query object in place of a collection when accessed. filter() criterion may be applied as well as limits and offsets, either explicitly or via array slices:

class User(Base):
    __tablename__ = 'user'

    posts = relationship(Post, lazy="dynamic")

jack = session.query(User).get(id)

# filter Jack's blog posts
posts = jack.posts.filter(Post.headline=='this is a post')

# apply array slices
posts = jack.posts[5:20]

The dynamic relationship supports limited write operations, via the append() and remove() methods:

oldpost = jack.posts.filter(Post.headline=='old post').one()
jack.posts.remove(oldpost)

jack.posts.append(Post('new post'))

Since the read side of the dynamic relationship always queries the database, changes to the underlying collection will not be visible until the data has been flushed. However, as long as “autoflush” is enabled on the Session in use, this will occur automatically each time the collection is about to emit a query.

To place a dynamic relationship on a backref, use the backref() function in conjunction with lazy='dynamic':

class Post(Base):
    __table__ = posts_table

    user = relationship(User,
                backref=backref('posts', lazy='dynamic')
            )

Note that eager/lazy loading options cannot be used in conjunction dynamic relationships at this time.

Setting Noload¶

A “noload” relationship never loads from the database, even when accessed. It is configured using lazy='noload':

class MyClass(Base):
    __tablename__ = 'some_table'

    children = relationship(MyOtherClass, lazy='noload')

Above, the children collection is fully writeable, and changes to it will be persisted to the database as well as locally available for reading at the time they are added. However when instances of MyClass are freshly loaded from the database, the children collection stays empty.

Using Passive Deletes¶

Use passive_deletes to disable child object loading on a DELETE operation, in conjunction with “ON DELETE (CASCADE|SET NULL)” on your database to automatically cascade deletes to child objects:

class MyClass(Base):
    __tablename__ = 'mytable'
    id = Column(Integer, primary_key=True)
    children = relationship("MyOtherClass",
                    cascade="all, delete-orphan",
                    passive_deletes=True)

class MyOtherClass(Base):
    __tablename__ = 'myothertable'
    id = Column(Integer, primary_key=True)
    parent_id = Column(Integer,
                ForeignKey('mytable.id', ondelete='CASCADE')
                    )

When passive_deletes is applied, the children relationship will not be loaded into memory when an instance of MyClass is marked for deletion. The cascade="all, delete-orphan" will take effect for instances of MyOtherClass which are currently present in the session; however for instances of MyOtherClass which are not loaded, SQLAlchemy assumes that “ON DELETE CASCADE” rules will ensure that those rows are deleted by the database.

Dictionary Collections¶

A little extra detail is needed when using a dictionary as a collection. This because objects are always loaded from the database as lists, and a key-generation strategy must be available to populate the dictionary correctly. The attribute_mapped_collection() function is by far the most common way to achieve a simple dictionary collection. It produces a dictionary class that will apply a particular attribute of the mapped class as a key. Below we map an Item class containing a dictionary of Note items keyed to the Note.keyword attribute:

from sqlalchemy import Column, Integer, String, ForeignKey
from sqlalchemy.orm import relationship
from sqlalchemy.orm.collections import attribute_mapped_collection
from sqlalchemy.ext.declarative import declarative_base

Base = declarative_base()

class Item(Base):
    __tablename__ = 'item'
    id = Column(Integer, primary_key=True)
    notes = relationship("Note",
                collection_class=attribute_mapped_collection('keyword'),
                cascade="all, delete-orphan")

class Note(Base):
    __tablename__ = 'note'
    id = Column(Integer, primary_key=True)
    item_id = Column(Integer, ForeignKey('item.id'), nullable=False)
    keyword = Column(String)
    text = Column(String)

    def __init__(self, keyword, text):
        self.keyword = keyword
        self.text = text

Item.notes is then a dictionary:

>>> item = Item()
>>> item.notes['a'] = Note('a', 'atext')
>>> item.notes.items()
{'a': <__main__.Note object at 0x2eaaf0>}

attribute_mapped_collection() will ensure that the .keyword attribute of each Note complies with the key in the dictionary. Such as, when assigning to Item.notes, the dictionary key we supply must match that of the actual Note object:

item = Item()
item.notes = {
            'a': Note('a', 'atext'),
            'b': Note('b', 'btext')
        }

The attribute which attribute_mapped_collection() uses as a key does not need to be mapped at all! Using a regular Python @property allows virtually any detail or combination of details about the object to be used as the key, as below when we establish it as a tuple of Note.keyword and the first ten letters of the Note.text field:

class Item(Base):
    __tablename__ = 'item'
    id = Column(Integer, primary_key=True)
    notes = relationship("Note",
                collection_class=attribute_mapped_collection('note_key'),
                backref="item",
                cascade="all, delete-orphan")

class Note(Base):
    __tablename__ = 'note'
    id = Column(Integer, primary_key=True)
    item_id = Column(Integer, ForeignKey('item.id'), nullable=False)
    keyword = Column(String)
    text = Column(String)

    @property
    def note_key(self):
        return (self.keyword, self.text[0:10])

    def __init__(self, keyword, text):
        self.keyword = keyword
        self.text = text

Above we added a Note.item backref. Assigning to this reverse relationship, the Note is added to the Item.notes dictionary and the key is generated for us automatically:

>>> item = Item()
>>> n1 = Note("a", "atext")
>>> n1.item = item
>>> item.notes
{('a', 'atext'): <__main__.Note object at 0x2eaaf0>}

Other built-in dictionary types include column_mapped_collection(), which is almost like attribute_mapped_collection() except given the Column object directly:

from sqlalchemy.orm.collections import column_mapped_collection

class Item(Base):
    __tablename__ = 'item'
    id = Column(Integer, primary_key=True)
    notes = relationship("Note",
                collection_class=column_mapped_collection(Note.__table__.c.keyword),
                cascade="all, delete-orphan")

as well as mapped_collection() which is passed any callable function. Note that it’s usually easier to use attribute_mapped_collection() along with a @property as mentioned earlier:

from sqlalchemy.orm.collections import mapped_collection

class Item(Base):
    __tablename__ = 'item'
    id = Column(Integer, primary_key=True)
    notes = relationship("Note",
                collection_class=mapped_collection(lambda note: note.text[0:10]),
                cascade="all, delete-orphan")

Dictionary mappings are often combined with the “Association Proxy” extension to produce streamlined dictionary views. See Proxying to Dictionary Based Collections and Composite Association Proxies for examples.

sqlalchemy.orm.collections.attribute_mapped_collection(attr_name)¶

A dictionary-based collection type with attribute-based keying.

Returns a MappedCollection factory with a keying based on the ‘attr_name’ attribute of entities in the collection, where attr_name is the string name of the attribute.

The key value must be immutable for the lifetime of the object. You can not, for example, map on foreign key values if those key values will change during the session, i.e. from None to a database-assigned integer after a session flush.

sqlalchemy.orm.collections.column_mapped_collection(mapping_spec)¶

A dictionary-based collection type with column-based keying.

Returns a MappedCollection factory with a keying function generated from mapping_spec, which may be a Column or a sequence of Columns.

The key value must be immutable for the lifetime of the object. You can not, for example, map on foreign key values if those key values will change during the session, i.e. from None to a database-assigned integer after a session flush.

sqlalchemy.orm.collections.mapped_collection(keyfunc)¶

A dictionary-based collection type with arbitrary keying.

Returns a MappedCollection factory with a keying function generated from keyfunc, a callable that takes an entity and returns a key value.

The key value must be immutable for the lifetime of the object. You can not, for example, map on foreign key values if those key values will change during the session, i.e. from None to a database-assigned integer after a session flush.

Annotating Custom Collections via Decorators¶

Decorators can be used to tag the individual methods the ORM needs to manage collections. Use them when your class doesn’t quite meet the regular interface for its container type, or when you otherwise would like to use a different method to get the job done.

from sqlalchemy.orm.collections import collection

class SetLike(object):
    __emulates__ = set

    def __init__(self):
        self.data = set()

    @collection.appender
    def append(self, item):
        self.data.add(item)

    def remove(self, item):
        self.data.remove(item)

    def __iter__(self):
        return iter(self.data)

And that’s all that’s needed to complete the example. SQLAlchemy will add instances via the append method. remove and __iter__ are the default methods for sets and will be used for removing and iteration. Default methods can be changed as well:

from sqlalchemy.orm.collections import collection

class MyList(list):
    @collection.remover
    def zark(self, item):
        # do something special...

    @collection.iterator
    def hey_use_this_instead_for_iteration(self):
        # ...

There is no requirement to be list-, or set-like at all. Collection classes can be any shape, so long as they have the append, remove and iterate interface marked for SQLAlchemy’s use. Append and remove methods will be called with a mapped entity as the single argument, and iterator methods are called with no arguments and must return an iterator.

class sqlalchemy.orm.collections.collection¶

Decorators for entity collection classes.

The decorators fall into two groups: annotations and interception recipes.

The annotating decorators (appender, remover, iterator, linker, converter, internally_instrumented) indicate the method’s purpose and take no arguments. They are not written with parens:

@collection.appender
def append(self, append): ...

The recipe decorators all require parens, even those that take no arguments:

@collection.adds('entity')
def insert(self, position, entity): ...

@collection.removes_return()
def popitem(self): ...

static adds(arg)¶

Mark the method as adding an entity to the collection.

Adds “add to collection” handling to the method. The decorator argument indicates which method argument holds the SQLAlchemy-relevant value. Arguments can be specified positionally (i.e. integer) or by name:

@collection.adds(1)
def push(self, item): ...

@collection.adds('entity')
def do_stuff(self, thing, entity=None): ...

static appender(fn)¶

Tag the method as the collection appender.

The appender method is called with one positional argument: the value to append. The method will be automatically decorated with ‘adds(1)’ if not already decorated:

@collection.appender
def add(self, append): ...

# or, equivalently
@collection.appender
@collection.adds(1)
def add(self, append): ...

# for mapping type, an 'append' may kick out a previous value
# that occupies that slot.  consider d['a'] = 'foo'- any previous
# value in d['a'] is discarded.
@collection.appender
@collection.replaces(1)
def add(self, entity):
    key = some_key_func(entity)
    previous = None
    if key in self:
        previous = self[key]
    self[key] = entity
    return previous

If the value to append is not allowed in the collection, you may raise an exception. Something to remember is that the appender will be called for each object mapped by a database query. If the database contains rows that violate your collection semantics, you will need to get creative to fix the problem, as access via the collection will not work.

If the appender method is internally instrumented, you must also receive the keyword argument ‘_sa_initiator’ and ensure its promulgation to collection events.

static converter(fn)¶

Tag the method as the collection converter.

This optional method will be called when a collection is being replaced entirely, as in:

myobj.acollection = [newvalue1, newvalue2]

The converter method will receive the object being assigned and should return an iterable of values suitable for use by the appender method. A converter must not assign values or mutate the collection, its sole job is to adapt the value the user provides into an iterable of values for the ORM’s use.

The default converter implementation will use duck-typing to do the conversion. A dict-like collection will be convert into an iterable of dictionary values, and other types will simply be iterated:

@collection.converter
def convert(self, other): ...

If the duck-typing of the object does not match the type of this collection, a TypeError is raised.

Supply an implementation of this method if you want to expand the range of possible types that can be assigned in bulk or perform validation on the values about to be assigned.

static internally_instrumented(fn)¶

Tag the method as instrumented.

This tag will prevent any decoration from being applied to the method. Use this if you are orchestrating your own calls to collection_adapter() in one of the basic SQLAlchemy interface methods, or to prevent an automatic ABC method decoration from wrapping your implementation:

# normally an 'extend' method on a list-like class would be
# automatically intercepted and re-implemented in terms of
# SQLAlchemy events and append().  your implementation will
# never be called, unless:
@collection.internally_instrumented
def extend(self, items): ...

static iterator(fn)¶

Tag the method as the collection remover.

The iterator method is called with no arguments. It is expected to return an iterator over all collection members:

@collection.iterator
def __iter__(self): ...

static link(fn)¶

deprecated; synonym for collection.linker().

static linker(fn)¶

Tag the method as a “linked to attribute” event handler.

This optional event handler will be called when the collection class is linked to or unlinked from the InstrumentedAttribute. It is invoked immediately after the ‘_sa_adapter’ property is set on the instance. A single argument is passed: the collection adapter that has been linked, or None if unlinking.

Deprecated since version 1.0.0: - the collection.linker() handler is superseded by the AttributeEvents.init_collection() and AttributeEvents.dispose_collection() handlers.

static remover(fn)¶

Tag the method as the collection remover.

The remover method is called with one positional argument: the value to remove. The method will be automatically decorated with removes_return() if not already decorated:

@collection.remover
def zap(self, entity): ...

# or, equivalently
@collection.remover
@collection.removes_return()
def zap(self, ): ...

If the value to remove is not present in the collection, you may raise an exception or return None to ignore the error.

If the remove method is internally instrumented, you must also receive the keyword argument ‘_sa_initiator’ and ensure its promulgation to collection events.

static removes(arg)¶

Mark the method as removing an entity in the collection.

Adds “remove from collection” handling to the method. The decorator argument indicates which method argument holds the SQLAlchemy-relevant value to be removed. Arguments can be specified positionally (i.e. integer) or by name:

@collection.removes(1)
def zap(self, item): ...

For methods where the value to remove is not known at call-time, use collection.removes_return.

static removes_return()¶

Mark the method as removing an entity in the collection.

Adds “remove from collection” handling to the method. The return value of the method, if any, is considered the value to remove. The method arguments are not inspected:

@collection.removes_return()
def pop(self): ...

For methods where the value to remove is known at call-time, use collection.remove.

static replaces(arg)¶

Mark the method as replacing an entity in the collection.

Adds “add to collection” and “remove from collection” handling to the method. The decorator argument indicates which method argument holds the SQLAlchemy-relevant value to be added, and return value, if any will be considered the value to remove.

Arguments can be specified positionally (i.e. integer) or by name:

@collection.replaces(2)
def __setitem__(self, index, item): ...

Custom Dictionary-Based Collections¶

The MappedCollection class can be used as a base class for your custom types or as a mix-in to quickly add dict collection support to other classes. It uses a keying function to delegate to __setitem__ and __delitem__:

from sqlalchemy.util import OrderedDict
from sqlalchemy.orm.collections import MappedCollection

class NodeMap(OrderedDict, MappedCollection):
    """Holds 'Node' objects, keyed by the 'name' attribute with insert order maintained."""

    def __init__(self, *args, **kw):
        MappedCollection.__init__(self, keyfunc=lambda node: node.name)
        OrderedDict.__init__(self, *args, **kw)

When subclassing MappedCollection, user-defined versions of __setitem__() or __delitem__() should be decorated with collection.internally_instrumented(), if they call down to those same methods on MappedCollection. This because the methods on MappedCollection are already instrumented - calling them from within an already instrumented call can cause events to be fired off repeatedly, or inappropriately, leading to internal state corruption in rare cases:

from sqlalchemy.orm.collections import MappedCollection,\
                                    collection

class MyMappedCollection(MappedCollection):
    """Use @internally_instrumented when your methods
    call down to already-instrumented methods.

    """

    @collection.internally_instrumented
    def __setitem__(self, key, value, _sa_initiator=None):
        # do something with key, value
        super(MyMappedCollection, self).__setitem__(key, value, _sa_initiator)

    @collection.internally_instrumented
    def __delitem__(self, key, _sa_initiator=None):
        # do something with key
        super(MyMappedCollection, self).__delitem__(key, _sa_initiator)

The ORM understands the dict interface just like lists and sets, and will automatically instrument all dict-like methods if you choose to subclass dict or provide dict-like collection behavior in a duck-typed class. You must decorate appender and remover methods, however- there are no compatible methods in the basic dictionary interface for SQLAlchemy to use by default. Iteration will go through itervalues() unless otherwise decorated.

from sqlalchemy.orm.collections import _instrument_class, MappedCollection
_instrument_class(MappedCollection)

class sqlalchemy.orm.collections.MappedCollection(keyfunc)¶

Bases: __builtin__.dict

A basic dictionary-based collection class.

Extends dict with the minimal bag semantics that collection classes require. set and remove are implemented in terms of a keying function: any callable that takes an object and returns an object for use as a dictionary key.

__init__(keyfunc)¶

Create a new collection with keying provided by keyfunc.

keyfunc may be any callable that takes an object and returns an object for use as a dictionary key.

The keyfunc will be called every time the ORM needs to add a member by value-only (such as when loading instances from the database) or remove a member. The usual cautions about dictionary keying apply- keyfunc(object) should return the same output for the life of the collection. Keying based on mutable properties can result in unreachable instances “lost” in the collection.

clear() → None. Remove all items from D.¶

pop(k[, d]) → v, remove specified key and return the corresponding value.¶

If key is not found, d is returned if given, otherwise KeyError is raised

popitem() → (k, v), remove and return some (key, value) pair as a¶

2-tuple; but raise KeyError if D is empty.

remove(value, _sa_initiator=None)¶

Remove an item by value, consulting the keyfunc for the key.

set(value, _sa_initiator=None)¶

Add an item by value, consulting the keyfunc for the key.

setdefault(k[, d]) → D.get(k,d), also set D[k]=d if k not in D¶

update([E, ]**F) → None. Update D from dict/iterable E and F.¶

If E present and has a .keys() method, does: for k in E: D[k] = E[k] If E present and lacks .keys() method, does: for (k, v) in E: D[k] = v In either case, this is followed by: for k in F: D[k] = F[k]

Instrumentation and Custom Types¶

Many custom types and existing library classes can be used as a entity collection type as-is without further ado. However, it is important to note that the instrumentation process will modify the type, adding decorators around methods automatically.

The decorations are lightweight and no-op outside of relationships, but they do add unneeded overhead when triggered elsewhere. When using a library class as a collection, it can be good practice to use the “trivial subclass” trick to restrict the decorations to just your usage in relationships. For example:

class MyAwesomeList(some.great.library.AwesomeList):
    pass

# ... relationship(..., collection_class=MyAwesomeList)

The ORM uses this approach for built-ins, quietly substituting a trivial subclass when a list, set or dict is used directly.