Accessors & Mutators

Sea-ORM provides ActiveModelBehavior for hooks (before_save/after_save) and derived methods for common access patterns.

ActiveModelBehavior

impl ActiveModelBehavior for ActiveModel {
    fn before_save<C>(self, _db: &C, insert: bool) -> Result<Self, DbErr>
    where
        C: ConnectionTrait,
    {
        let mut this = self;
        if insert {
            // Set creation timestamp on insert
            this.created_at = Set(chrono::Utc::now());
        }
        // Always update the updated_at timestamp
        this.updated_at = Set(chrono::Utc::now());
        Ok(this)
    }
}

Derived Accessors

Sea-ORM automatically generates accessor methods for each column, making field access type-safe.

// Accessor methods are available on Model instances
println!("User ID: {}", user.id);
println!("Username: {}", user.username);