`sea-orm-cli generate entity` emits `rs_type = "Enum"` instead of `rs_type = "String"` for PostgreSQL native enums

[lethib]

Description

When generating entities from a PostgreSQL database that contains native ENUM types, sea-orm-cli generate entity --entity-format dense emits rs_type = "Enum" in the #[sea_orm(...)] attribute of the generated ActiveEnum, instead of rs_type = "String".

Enum is not a valid Rust type, so the generated sea_orm_active_enums.rs does not compile as-is. The correct value (per the documentation) might be rs_type = "String".

Steps to Reproduce

1. Create a PostgreSQL native enum type and a table using it:

CREATE TYPE payment_method AS ENUM ('card', 'cash', 'check', 'transfer');

CREATE TABLE payments (
    id           serial PRIMARY KEY,
    method       payment_method NOT NULL
);

2. Generate entities using the dense format:

sea-orm-cli generate entity \
  --database-url postgres://... \
  --with-serde both \
  --entity-format dense \
  --impl-active-model-behavior=false \
  -o ./src/models/_entities/

3. Open the generated src/models/_entities/sea_orm_active_enums.rs.

Expected Behavior

The generated ActiveEnum uses rs_type = "String":

#[derive(Debug, Clone, PartialEq, Eq, EnumIter, DeriveActiveEnum, Serialize, Deserialize)]
#[sea_orm(rs_type = "String", db_type = "Enum", enum_name = "payment_method")]
pub enum PaymentMethod {
    #[sea_orm(string_value = "card")]
    Card,
    #[sea_orm(string_value = "cash")]
    Cash,
    #[sea_orm(string_value = "check")]
    Check,
    #[sea_orm(string_value = "transfer")]
    Transfer,
}

Actual Behavior

rs_type is generated as "Enum", which is not a valid Rust type and fails to compile:

#[derive(Debug, Clone, PartialEq, Eq, EnumIter, DeriveActiveEnum, Serialize, Deserialize)]
#[sea_orm(rs_type = "Enum", db_type = "Enum", enum_name = "payment_method")]
pub enum PaymentMethod {
    #[sea_orm(string_value = "card")]
    Card,
    // ...
}

Reproduces How Often

Always, on every entity generation, for every PostgreSQL native enum column.

Workarounds

Manually editing rs_type = "Enum" back to rs_type = "String" after each generation produces working, compiling code. Post-processing the generated file (search/replace rs_type = "Enum" → rs_type = "String") as part of the generation pipeline works around it automatically.

Versions

sea-bae v0.2.1
sea-orm v2.0.0-rc.41
sea-orm-cli v2.0.0-rc.41
sea-orm-macros v2.0.0-rc.41
sea-orm-migration v2.0.0-rc.41
sea-query v1.0.1
sea-query-derive v1.0.0
sea-query-sqlx v0.9.1
sea-schema v0.18.0
sea-schema-derive v0.3.0

• Database: PostgreSQL (via sqlx-postgres)
• OS: macOS 26.5.1 (arm64)
• --entity-format dense

[lethib]

This bug didn't exist on the 1.1 Sea ORM version, I just updated to V2

[Huliiiiii]

Could you provide the error message? The Enum is sea-query::Enum.

[lethib]

Here are my errors:

error[E0308]: mismatched types
   --> src/models/user_business_informations.rs:25:32
    |
 25 |     Profession::try_from_value(&self.profession)
    |     -------------------------- ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ expected `&Enum`, found `&String`
    |     |
    |     arguments to this function are incorrect
    |
    = note: expected reference `&sea_orm::sea_query::Enum`
               found reference `&std::string::String`
note: associated function defined here
   --> /Users/thibault/.cargo/registry/src/index.crates.io-1949cf8c6b5b557f/sea-orm-2.0.0-rc.41/src/entity/active_enum.rs:126:8
    |
126 |     fn try_from_value(v: &Self::Value) -> Result<Self, DbErr>;
    |        ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

error[E0308]: mismatched types
  --> src/views/user.rs:25:19
   |
25 |       profession: business_information.profession.to_value(),
   |                   ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ expected `String`, found `Enum`

For more information about this error, try `rustc --explain E0308`.

[Huliiiiii]

This is a breaking change in 2.0, the generated values is now replaced by sea_query::Enum, because String cannot carry metadata.

Previously, we worked around this limitation with a few hacks. To fully resolve that issue, those hacks have been removed.

You need to update your code to construct Enum manually, for example:

sea_query::Enum {
    type_name: Profession::name().inner().into(),
    value: self.profession.into(),
}

We will add implementations such as TryFrom<String> in a future update.

[lethib]

Ok, fine with something like TryFrom<String> to reduce code boilerplate.

However, this is not documented in the ActiveEnum page:

• all types are rs_type = "String"
• no mention of the use of sea_orm::sea_query::Enum

Do you want me to open another issue for that ?

[Huliiiiii]

Yes, please open an issue in https://github.com/SeaQL/seaql.github.io

[lethib]

@Huliiiiii I have decided to open a PR for that to fix that quickly: SeaQL/seaql.github.io#180