It's really quite interesting that they build the queries from the AST. To contrast C# generates the Sql for Linq to Sql by building up an expression tree using the IQueryable interface.
This simplifies step one of the Pony ORM author's answer.
My point is the scale is absolute. Somebody who rates themselves a 9 on C++ knowledge probably doesn't realize how much there truly is to know. Sort of a corollary to the dunning-krueger effect.