Behavior of model_class in Version 3.0.0a1

[jrast]

So far I used the following code to set the modeL_class:

from flask_security import SQLAlchemyUserDatastore
from flask_sqlalchemy import SQLAlchemy
from sqlalchemy import Column, Integer
from sqlalchemy.ext.declarative import declared_attr, declarative_base


_Base = declarative_base()


class BaseModel(_Base):
    """Base model for database objects

    The base model contains a `id` column as primary key
    """

    __abstract__ = True

    @declared_attr
    def __table_args__(cls):
        return {
            "mysql_engine": "InnoDB",
        }

    id = Column(Integer, primary_key=True)


db: SQLAlchemy = SQLAlchemy(model_class=BaseModel)

This was working as expected and the .query property was added to the models as expected. Since Version 3.0.0a1 this no longer works (for example the .query property is missing). Is this intentional? Is it required to use flask_sqlalchemy.Model now as a base class? If this is the case, this would make it harder to use the models outside of the flask context which is required in some cases.

[davidism]

This was an oversight while rewriting the code, I'll add model.query for existing bases back in.

In general, it's required to subclass Flask-SQLAlchemy classes to get Flask-SQLAlchemy behaviors. Note that you're also missing out on other behaviors, such as automatic table names, bind keys, and a nice repr.

However, the entire query interface is considered legacy in SQLAlchemy now. See the discussion in their docs. SQLAlchemy wants you to move to db.select(User) to construct queries, and db.session.execute(q) to execute them.

[jrast]

Would you recommend to use the select / execute interface for extensions? At least where the additional functionality of flask-sqlalchemy is not required.

[davidism]

I recommend whatever SQLAlchemy recommends. The extension changes very little about the actual use of SQLAlchemy, that hasn't changed.