Question

i have few confusion regarding ORM(Object Relational Mapping)

i am thinking about to use ORM in my upcoming website (Social Network)

1. Is ORM faster way to access/manipulate database?

2. how do i call procedure or function if i use ORM.

3. Is it good idea to use ORM for social networking site where traffic may be high (200 user may access website concurrently)(i am sure user can not greater than 10 000)

Answer 1

Please don’t take it as offence, but if the only thing you’re concerned with is what performance penalty you might get by using ORM, you’re already doing it wrong. )

Actually there’s a plenty of factors to take into account. The tags suggest you intend to use PHP-MySQL combination in your project. But do you really know these tools – or you want to learn them in process?

If latter, I’d definitely recommend using ORM no matter what – but not a standalone one. I suggest building your project on an established (and well-documented) MVC framework instead – and using its ORM. See, it’s one thing to work with ORM as with an abstract concept – and another to use it as a tool in the context of a specific framework.

What framework to choose, that’s another question; I really suggest looking at Symfony 2 – it’s integrated with a really powerful ORM library (Doctrine), but you still can use direct queries if you need it. )

P.S. I suggest reading this brilliant post of Martin Fowler: it’s not so much about ‘ORM hate’, instead focusing mostly on how ORM should be perceived in general.