Enumeration

Create an Enum

An enumeration or rather Enum, allows you to restrict your set of options into values that are relevant.

Why use an Enum?

In a situation where we need to create a departmental application, e.g a Software Organization with Developers from different fields: Such as .Net developer, Java Developer, Ruby Developer, etc, In this case, it would be better to use an Enum (and not a magic string) to organize the types we have among this developers within the organization.

Example 1:

       protected void Button1_Click(object sender, EventArgs e)

        {

            var developer = new Engineer();

            hero.Name = heroNameTextBox.Text;

            EngineerType selection;

            if(Enum.TryParse(heroTypeDropDownList.SelectedValue, out selection))

            {

                hero.Type = selection;

            }

            resultLabel.Text += "You selected a " + selection + "!";

        }

    }

    public class Engineer

    {

        public string Name { get; set; }

        public EngineerType Type { get; set; }

    }

    public enum EngineerType

    {

        dotNet,

        Java,

        Csharp,

        C,

    }

Save and Run:

Diagram showing Enumeration Application 

Example 2 : 

Create a Pet class that uses enum Type for the Pet types instead of a String for the Pet Type.

namespace EnumerationLesson

{

    public class Pet

    {

          public string Name { get; set; }

          public int Age { get; set; }

            //public string Type { get; set; } // Replaced with PetType Type

          public PetType Type { get; set; }

          private StringBuilder _sb;

            //public Pet(string Name, int Age, string Type)

         public Pet(string Name, int Age, PetType Type)

        {

            this.Name = Name;

            this.Age = Age;

            this.Type = Type;

           _sb = new StringBuilder();

        }

 //Create an enum PetType and replace the string identifier for Type property to PetType.

 // Here is how you create an enum:

        public enum PetType

        {

            dog,

            snake,

            cat,

            tortoise,

         }

       

 Learn also: How to create database

Happy coding!

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