eliminating duplicate Enum code

Question

I have a large number of Enums that implement this interface:

/**
 * Interface for an enumeration, each element of which can be uniquely identified by it's code
 */
public interface CodableEnum {

    /**
     * Get the element with a particular code
     * @param code
     * @return
     */
    public CodableEnum getByCode(String code);

    /**
     * Get the code that identifies an element of the enum
     * @return
     */
    public String getCode();
}

A typical example is:

public enum IMType implements CodableEnum {

    MSN_MESSENGER("msn_messenger"),
    GOOGLE_TALK("google_talk"),
    SKYPE("skype"),
    YAHOO_MESSENGER("yahoo_messenger");

    private final String code;

    IMType (String code) {
        this.code = code;
    }

    public String getCode() {
        return code;
    }   

    public IMType getByCode(String code) {
        for (IMType e : IMType.values()) {
            if (e.getCode().equalsIgnoreCase(code)) {
                return e;
            }
        }
    }
}

As you can imagine these methods are virtually identical in all implementations of CodableEnum. I would like to eliminate this duplication, but frankly don't know how. I tried using a class such as the following:

public abstract class DefaultCodableEnum implements CodableEnum {

    private final String code;

    DefaultCodableEnum(String code) {
        this.code = code;
    }

    public String getCode() {
        return this.code;
    }   

    public abstract CodableEnum getByCode(String code);  
}

But this turns out to be fairly useless because:

1. An enum cannot extend a class
2. Elements of an enum (SKYPE, GOOGLE_TALK, etc.) cannot extend a class
3. I cannot provide a default implementation of getByCode(), because DefaultCodableEnum is not itself an Enum. I tried changing DefaultCodableEnum to extend java.lang.Enum, but this doesn't appear to be allowed.

Any suggestions that do not rely on reflection? Thanks, Don

Answer 1

It seems like you are actually implementing run time type information. Java provides this as a language feature.

I suggest you look up RTTI or reflection.

Answer 2

In your specific case, the getCode() / getByCode(String code) methods seems very closed (euphemistically speaking) to the behaviour of the toString() / valueOf(String value) methods provided by all enumeration. Why don't you want to use them?

Answer 3

Another solution would be not to put anything into the enum itself, and just provide a bi-directional map Enum <-> Code for each enum. You could e.g. use ImmutableBiMap from Google Collections for this.

That way there no duplicate code at all.

Example:

public enum MYENUM{
  VAL1,VAL2,VAL3;
}

/** Map MYENUM to its ID */
public static final ImmutableBiMap<MYENUM, Integer> MYENUM_TO_ID = 
new ImmutableBiMap.Builder<MYENUM, Integer>().
put(MYENUM.VAL1, 1).
put(MYENUM.VAL2, 2).
put(MYENUM.VAL3, 3).
build();

Answer 4

Unfortunately, I don't think that there is a way to do this. Your best bet would pro ably be to give up in emums altogether and use conventional class extension and static members. Otherwise, get used to duplicating that code. Sorry.

Answer 5

I had a similar issue with a localization component that I wrote. My component is designed to access localized messages with enum constants that index into a resource bundle, not a hard problem.

I found that I was copying and pasting the same "template" enum code all over the place. My solution to avoid the duplication is a code generator that accepts an XML configuration file with the enum constant names and constructor args. The output is the Java source code with the "duplicated" behaviors.

Now, I maintain the configuration files and the generator, not all of the duplicated code. Everywhere I would have had enum source code, there is now an XML config file. My build scripts detect out-of-date generated files and invoke the code generator to create the enum code.

You can see this component here. The template that I was copying and pasting is factored out into an XSLT stylesheet. The code generator runs the stylesheet transformation. An input file is quite concise compared to the generated enum source code.

HTH,
Greg

Answer 6

If you really want inheritance, don't forget that you can implement the enum pattern yourself, like in the bad old Java 1.4 days.