SQLAlchemy is a Python SQL toolkit and Object Relational Mapper (ORM) that gives application developers the full power and flexibility of SQL.

What am I talking about? I’m talking of a python library that helps you “convert” your database rows into python objects.
Zope is python-based, hence it’s easy to install and use this library with a standard Zope/Plone app.

These packages help you integrate SQLAlchemy in a Zope/Plone application:

• z3c.saconfig: Minimal SQLAlchemy ORM session configuration for Zope
• zope.sqlalchemy: Minimal Zope/SQLAlchemy transaction integration
• SQLAlchemy: Python SQL toolkit and Object Relational Mapper

The package z3c.saconfig is based on zope.sqlalchemy and zope.sqlalchemy is based on SQLAlchemy.
Therefore, you can add the z3c.saconfig egg to your buildout to automatically download all the packages.
You can also use EasyInstall to install these packages, anyway I’d suggest using the buildout to keep things separated.