Getting started #

Before diving into how Prisma ORM is used in Dart & Flutter, let's learn how to use it in Dart applications.

Prerequisites #

Dart SDK: >=2.18.0 <3.0.0

Installing #

Depend on it.

dart pub add orm

dependencies:
    orm: latest

Setup #

Set up Prisma with the init command of the Prisma CLI:

dart run orm init --datasource-provider sqlite

This creates a new prisma directory with your Prisma schema file and configures SQLite as your database. You're now ready to model your data and create your database with some tables.

Model your data #

The Prisma schema provides an intuitive way to model data. Add the following models to your schema.prisma file:

model User {
  id    Int     @id @default(autoincrement())
  email String  @unique
  name  String?
  posts Post[]
}

model Post {
  id        Int     @id @default(autoincrement())
  title     String
  content   String?
  published Boolean @default(false)
  author    User    @relation(fields: [authorId], references: [id])
  authorId  Int
}

Models in the Prisma schema have two main purposes:

• Represent the tables in the underlying database
• Serve as foundation for the generated Prisma Client API

Push database table #

When you finish editing the schema.prisma heavy data table definition, you need to push it into the database to create these tables, relationships and indexes.

Run this command:

dart run orm db push

Install json_serializable, build_runner and freezed #

dart pub add freezed -d
dart pub add json_serializable -d
dart pub add build_runner -d

Generate client #

The generate command generates assets like Prisma Client based on the generator and data model blocks defined in your prisma/schema.prisma file.

dart run orm generate
dart run build_runner build

Explore Prisma client #

The default Prisma client is located in lib/prisma_client.dart, just need this:

import "prisma_client.dart";

final PrismaClient prisma = createPrismaClient();

void main() async {
    try {
     // ... you will write your Prisma Client queries here
    } catch(e) {
        print(e.toString());
    } finally {
        await prisma.$disconnect();
    }
}

Create a new User record #

Let's start with a small query to create a new User record in the database and log the resulting object to the console. Add the following code to your main.dart file:

import "prisma_client.dart";

final PrismaClient prisma = createPrismaClient();

void main() async {
    try {
     final User user = await prisma.user.create(
        data: CreateOneUserData.withUserUncheckedCreateInput(
            UserUncheckedCreateInput(
                name: 'Seven',
                email: 'seven@odroe.com',
            ),
        ),
     );
     print(user.toJson());
    } catch(e) {
        print(e.toString());
    } finally {
        await prisma.$disconnect();
    }
}

Next, execute the script with the following command:

dart run lib/main.dart

{ id: 1, email: 'seven@odroe.com', name: 'Seven' }

Great job, you just created your first database record with Prisma Client! 🎉

Retrieve all User records #

Prisma Client offers various queries to read data from your database. In this section, you'll use the findMany query that returns all the records in the database for a given model.

Delete the previous Prisma Client query and add the new findMany query instead:

import "prisma_client.dart";

final PrismaClient prisma = createPrismaClient();

void main() async {
    try {
     final users = await prisma.user.findMany()
     print(users);
    } catch(e) {
        print(e.toString());
    } finally {
        await prisma.$disconnect();
    }
}

Execute the script again:

dart run lib/main.dart

[{ id: 1, email: 'seven@odroe.com', name: 'Seven' }]

Notice how the single User object is now enclosed with square brackets in the console. That's because the findMany returned an array with a single object inside.