The Sitecore ORM Survey

Which Sitecore ORMs have you used?

  This question allowed respondents to choose more than one answer. The top three in order were:

• Glass.Mapper - 58.7% (27)
• Custom Item Generator - 36.96% (17)
• Classy SC - 23.91% (11)

Not shown on the graph but detailed in the comments 4 people were using home grown solutions and another 2 were using Compiled Domain Model. Only 4 response showed that they weren't using any OCM. I think it is encouraging to see that the vast majority of Sitecore developers are looking for some sort of  OCM solution to make their development easier. For those who didn't use an OCM the reasons stated were that the additional effort for a presentation based site didn't warrant the additional complexity of an OCM or this was there first Sitecore project. I would agree with both of these, if your new to Sitecore it is best to start with what Sitecore gives you so that you understand how it works before you try to abstract it away and if the site is mainly brochureware then there again isn't much advantage gained from using an OCM.

Which ORM do you prefer to use?

  The top three in order were:

• Glass.Mapper - 56.52% (26)
• Custom Item Generator - 15.22% (7)
• Classy SC - 21.74% (10)

Again those using their own internal libraries had mostly stuck with with their libraries as well as the guys using Compiled Domain Models.

What do you use your ORM for?

Two thirds (28) of response were using Code Generation with their OCM, I am assuming that this was probably using either Team Development for Sitecore, Custom Item Generator or Classy SC. It was encouraging to see that over 50% used their OCM to provide Page Editor support, this is one of Sitecore strongest features and if an OCM can't support this feature then the client isn't receiving the full feature set of Sitecore. MVC and Webform usage are almost at the same level which I was surprised and encouraged to see. MVC relies on the developer being able to make models that can be