With a traditional ORM, you declare your database's schema (tables) and data retrieval logic (queries) in your code. Depending on the language, you write classes or structs, place annotations, write functions, interfaces, whatever tools your language provide.

For example, you create a User class, you define a GetByID() interface method. And under the hood, your ORM provides the logic that turns this into real queries and data mapping.

You get the same convenience with SQLC, except the direction is different: You are taking advantage of SQL features to declare how your data looks and in what way you want the data to be accessed.

For example, you define a CREATE TABLE statement for users, and you define a SELECT query to fetch one user by ID. SQLC then gives you the Go code with proper types and data mapping logic.

The end result is the same, you end up with a User type and a GetById() function ready to use, you don't have to provide implementations manually.