it:ad:patterns:enums_start_with_undefined_strategy

IT:AD:Patterns:Enums Start with Undefined Strategy

Summary

Consider

public enum Gender{
  Male =1,
  Female =2
}

Much as you don't want to admit it…zero's are a common source of bugs. So if your code somehow ends up setting a property to:

  person.Gender=  (Gender)0

You'll be surprised to know that it won't complain, even if 0 is not a member of the enum list.

The only way that you can Validate such a scenario is by doing something like the following.

public static void Validate(this Person person){
   if ( ((int)person.Gender) == 0){throw ....}
}

which of course nobody will do (as they'll be thinking about using the enum, not the unitituive int).

So just account for the use of a zero getting in there somehow. Put it at the beginning of the enum:

public enum Gender{
  Undefined=0
  Male =1,
  Female =2
}

Now you can test for it.

public static void Validate(this Person person){
   if (person.Gender == Gender.Undefined){throw ....}
}

While you're at it, you might as well consider whether there is such a case as Unknown. In which case, give it a value of 1:

public enum Gender{
  Undefined=0,
  Unknown=1,
  Male =2,
  Female =3,
}

Now it's clearer.

  • /home/skysigal/public_html/data/pages/it/ad/patterns/enums_start_with_undefined_strategy.txt
  • Last modified: 2023/11/04 03:28
  • by 127.0.0.1