I’m going to try to make it a point to publish a blog post after each class; Tuesday and Thursday evenings up until October. This gives me the opportunity to reinforce what I’ve learned, a paper trail to look back at, and a chance to share the knowledge!

Object Relational Mapping (ORM)

We started Module 12 today, with focus on ORMs, specifically, Sequelize. I have to say, after using MySQL syntax, Sequelize is a breath of fresh air. Through this Node.js ORM, JavaScript developers like myself are able to work with relational databases more easily. In it’s most basic description, Sequelize takes our JS syntax and translates it into MySQL’s syntax. Let’s just say it’s more convenient to call findAll() than it is to SELECT * FROM this_database;

ESLint

Now this is a VSCode extension I’ve had installed since the very beginning of my full-stack journey. A tech article suggested it in its list of the top VS extensions every developer needs — but did I really understand what it’s used for? Not until tonight. ESLint makes cleaning up my code so much easier since it clearly shows me what issues I have in my code. Once you have the ESLint VSCode extension and Node.js package installed (in your root project folder) then errors are shown directly in your VS Code editor, and also when you run “npm run test” in terminal (see CodeSnap below.) It’s easy to see why this feature is so valuable — it helps make your code more readable and accurate!

Sources: Sequelize.org, ESLint

Thanks for reading,

</Jessica>