This was a decision on the part of the people who created .NET. An enum is backed by another value type (int
, short
, byte
, etc), and so it can actually have any value that is valid for those value types.
I personally am not a fan of the way this works, so I made a series of utility methods:
/// <summary>
/// Utility methods for enum values. This static type will fail to initialize
/// (throwing a <see cref="TypeInitializationException"/>) if
/// you try to provide a value that is not an enum.
/// </summary>
/// <typeparam name="T">An enum type. </typeparam>
public static class EnumUtil<T>
where T : struct, IConvertible // Try to get as much of a static check as we can.
{
// The .NET framework doesn't provide a compile-checked
// way to ensure that a type is an enum, so we have to check when the type
// is statically invoked.
static EnumUtil()
{
// Throw Exception on static initialization if the given type isn't an enum.
Require.That(typeof (T).IsEnum, () => typeof(T).FullName + " is not an enum type.");
}
/// <summary>
/// In the .NET Framework, objects can be cast to enum values which are not
/// defined for their type. This method provides a simple fail-fast check
/// that the enum value is defined, and creates a cast at the same time.
/// Cast the given value as the given enum type.
/// Throw an exception if the value is not defined for the given enum type.
/// </summary>
/// <typeparam name="T"></typeparam>
/// <param name="enumValue"></param>
/// <exception cref="InvalidCastException">
/// If the given value is not a defined value of the enum type.
/// </exception>
/// <returns></returns>
public static T DefinedCast(object enumValue)
{
if (!System.Enum.IsDefined(typeof(T), enumValue))
throw new InvalidCastException(enumValue + " is not a defined value for enum type " +
typeof (T).FullName);
return (T) enumValue;
}
/// <summary>
///
/// </summary>
/// <param name="enumValue"></param>
/// <returns></returns>
public static T Parse(string enumValue)
{
var parsedValue = (T)System.Enum.Parse(typeof (T), enumValue);
//Require that the parsed value is defined
Require.That(parsedValue.IsDefined(),
() => new ArgumentException(string.Format("{0} is not a defined value for enum type {1}",
enumValue, typeof(T).FullName)));
return parsedValue;
}
public static bool IsDefined(T enumValue)
{
return System.Enum.IsDefined(typeof (T), enumValue);
}
}
public static class EnumExtensions
{
public static bool IsDefined<T>(this T enumValue)
where T : struct, IConvertible
{
return EnumUtil<T>.IsDefined(enumValue);
}
}
This way, I can say:
if(!sEnum.IsDefined()) throw new Exception(...);
... or:
EnumUtil<Stooge>.Parse(s); // throws an exception if s is not a defined value.
Update
As Brandon Kramer pointed out in the comments, C# 7.3 introduced some new generic types that allow the where T : struct, IConvertible
above to be replaced with where T : Enum
, to get better compile-time checking of the Enum-ness of the type being passed in. That way you can get rid of the guard statement in EnumUtil's static constructor.