Getting attributes of Enum's value

Question

I would like to know if it is possible to get attributes of the enum values and not of the enum itself? For example, suppose I have the following enum:

using System.ComponentModel; // for DescriptionAttribute

enum FunkyAttributesEnum
{
    [Description("Name With Spaces1")]
    NameWithoutSpaces1,    
    [Description("Name With Spaces2")]
    NameWithoutSpaces2
}

What I want is given the enum type, produce 2-tuples of enum string value and its description.

Value was easy:

Array values = System.Enum.GetValues(typeof(FunkyAttributesEnum));
foreach (int value in values)
    Tuple.Value = Enum.GetName(typeof(FunkyAttributesEnum), value);

But how do I get description attribute's value, to populate Tuple.Desc? I can think of how to do it if the Attribute belongs to the enum itself, but I am at a loss as to how to get it from the value of the enum.

Answer 1

This should do what you need.

var enumType = typeof(FunkyAttributesEnum);
var memberInfos = enumType.GetMember(FunkyAttributesEnum.NameWithoutSpaces1.ToString());
var enumValueMemberInfo = memberInfos.FirstOrDefault(m => m.DeclaringType == enumType);
var valueAttributes = 
      enumValueMemberInfo.GetCustomAttributes(typeof(DescriptionAttribute), false);
var description = ((DescriptionAttribute)valueAttributes[0]).Description;

Answer 2

This piece of code should give you a nice little extension method on any enum that lets you retrieve a generic attribute. I believe it's different to the lambda function above because it's simpler to use and slightly - you only need to pass in the generic type.

public static class EnumHelper
{
    /// <summary>
    /// Gets an attribute on an enum field value
    /// </summary>
    /// <typeparam name="T">The type of the attribute you want to retrieve</typeparam>
    /// <param name="enumVal">The enum value</param>
    /// <returns>The attribute of type T that exists on the enum value</returns>
    /// <example>string desc = myEnumVariable.GetAttributeOfType<DescriptionAttribute>().Description;</example>
    public static T GetAttributeOfType<T>(this Enum enumVal) where T:System.Attribute
    {
        var type = enumVal.GetType();
        var memInfo = type.GetMember(enumVal.ToString());
        var attributes = memInfo[0].GetCustomAttributes(typeof(T), false);
        return (attributes.Length > 0) ? (T)attributes[0] : null;
    }
}

Answer 3

This is a generic implementation using a lambda for the selection

public static Expected GetAttributeValue<T, Expected>(this Enum enumeration, Func<T, Expected> expression)
    where T : Attribute
{
    T attribute =
      enumeration
        .GetType()
        .GetMember(enumeration.ToString())
        .Where(member => member.MemberType == MemberTypes.Field)
        .FirstOrDefault()
        .GetCustomAttributes(typeof(T), false)
        .Cast<T>()
        .SingleOrDefault();

    if (attribute == null)
        return default(Expected);

    return expression(attribute);
}

Call it like this:

string description = targetLevel.GetAttributeValue<DescriptionAttribute, string>(x => x.Description);

Answer 4

I've merged a couple of the answers here to create a little more extensible solution. I'm providing it just in case it's helpful to anyone else in the future. Original posting here.

using System;
using System.ComponentModel;

public static class EnumExtensions {

    // This extension method is broken out so you can use a similar pattern with 
    // other MetaData elements in the future. This is your base method for each.
    public static T GetAttribute<T>(this Enum value) where T : Attribute {
        var type = value.GetType();
        var memberInfo = type.GetMember(value.ToString());
        var attributes = memberInfo[0].GetCustomAttributes(typeof(T), false);
        return attributes.Length > 0 
          ? (T)attributes[0]
          : null;
    }

    // This method creates a specific call to the above method, requesting the
    // Description MetaData attribute.
    public static string ToName(this Enum value) {
        var attribute = value.GetAttribute<DescriptionAttribute>();
        return attribute == null ? value.ToString() : attribute.Description;
    }

}

This solution creates a pair of extension methods on Enum. The first allows you to use reflection to retrieve any attribute associated with your value. The second specifically calls retrieves the DescriptionAttribute and returns it's Description value.

As an example, consider using the DescriptionAttribute attribute from System.ComponentModel

using System.ComponentModel;

public enum Days {
    [Description("Sunday")]
    Sun,
    [Description("Monday")]
    Mon,
    [Description("Tuesday")]
    Tue,
    [Description("Wednesday")]
    Wed,
    [Description("Thursday")]
    Thu,
    [Description("Friday")]
    Fri,
    [Description("Saturday")]
    Sat
}

To use the above extension method, you would now simply call the following:

Console.WriteLine(Days.Mon.ToName());

or

var day = Days.Mon;
Console.WriteLine(day.ToName());

Answer 5

In addition to AdamCrawford response, I've further created a more specialized extension methods that feed of it to get the description.

public static string GetAttributeDescription(this Enum enumValue)
{
    var attribute = enumValue.GetAttributeOfType<DescriptionAttribute>();
    return attribute == null ? String.Empty : attribute.Description;
} 

hence, to get the description, you could either use the original extension method as

string desc = myEnumVariable.GetAttributeOfType<DescriptionAttribute>().Description

or you could simply call the the extension method here as:

string desc = myEnumVariable.GetAttributeDescription();

Which should hopefully make your code a bit more readable.

Answer 6

Fluent one liner...

Here I'm using the DisplayAttribute which contains both the Name and Description properties.

public static DisplayAttribute GetDisplayAttributesFrom(this Enum enumValue, Type enumType)
{
    return enumType.GetMember(enumValue.ToString())
                   .First()
                   .GetCustomAttribute<DisplayAttribute>();
}

---

Example

public enum ModesOfTransport
{
    [Display(Name = "Driving",    Description = "Driving a car")]        Land,
    [Display(Name = "Flying",     Description = "Flying on a plane")]    Air,
    [Display(Name = "Sea cruise", Description = "Cruising on a dinghy")] Sea
}

void Main()
{
    ModesOfTransport TransportMode = ModesOfTransport.Sea;
    DisplayAttribute metadata = TransportMode.GetDisplayAttributesFrom(typeof(ModesOfTransport));
    Console.WriteLine("Name: {0} \nDescription: {1}", metadata.Name, metadata.Description);
}

---

Output

Name: Sea cruise 
Description: Cruising on a dinghy

Answer 7

Here is code to get information from a Display attribute. It uses a generic method to retrieve the attribute. If the attribute is not found it converts the enum value to a string with pascal/camel case converted to title case (code obtained here)

public static class EnumHelper
{
    // Get the Name value of the Display attribute if the   
    // enum has one, otherwise use the value converted to title case.  
    public static string GetDisplayName<TEnum>(this TEnum value)
        where TEnum : struct, IConvertible
    {
        var attr = value.GetAttributeOfType<TEnum, DisplayAttribute>();
        return attr == null ? value.ToString().ToSpacedTitleCase() : attr.Name;
    }

    // Get the ShortName value of the Display attribute if the   
    // enum has one, otherwise use the value converted to title case.  
    public static string GetDisplayShortName<TEnum>(this TEnum value)
        where TEnum : struct, IConvertible
    {
        var attr = value.GetAttributeOfType<TEnum, DisplayAttribute>();
        return attr == null ? value.ToString().ToSpacedTitleCase() : attr.ShortName;
    }

    /// <summary>
    /// Gets an attribute on an enum field value
    /// </summary>
    /// <typeparam name="TEnum">The enum type</typeparam>
    /// <typeparam name="T">The type of the attribute you want to retrieve</typeparam>
    /// <param name="value">The enum value</param>
    /// <returns>The attribute of type T that exists on the enum value</returns>
    private static T GetAttributeOfType<TEnum, T>(this TEnum value)
        where TEnum : struct, IConvertible
        where T : Attribute
    {

        return value.GetType()
                    .GetMember(value.ToString())
                    .First()
                    .GetCustomAttributes(false)
                    .OfType<T>()
                    .LastOrDefault();
    }
}

And this is the extension method for strings for converting to title case:

    /// <summary>
    /// Converts camel case or pascal case to separate words with title case
    /// </summary>
    /// <param name="s"></param>
    /// <returns></returns>
    public static string ToSpacedTitleCase(this string s)
    {
        //https://stackoverflow.com/a/155486/150342
        CultureInfo cultureInfo = Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentCulture;
        TextInfo textInfo = cultureInfo.TextInfo;
        return textInfo
           .ToTitleCase(Regex.Replace(s, 
                        "([a-z](?=[A-Z0-9])|[A-Z](?=[A-Z][a-z]))", "$1 "));
    }

Answer 8

Get the dictionary from enum.

public static IDictionary<string, int> ToDictionary(this Type enumType)
{
    return Enum.GetValues(enumType)
    .Cast<object>()
    .ToDictionary(v => ((Enum)v).ToEnumDescription(), k => (int)k); 
}

Now call this like...

var dic = typeof(ActivityType).ToDictionary();

EnumDecription Ext Method

public static string ToEnumDescription(this Enum en) //ext method
{
    Type type = en.GetType();
    MemberInfo[] memInfo = type.GetMember(en.ToString());
    if (memInfo != null && memInfo.Length > 0)
    {
        object[] attrs = memInfo[0].GetCustomAttributes(typeof(DescriptionAttribute), false);
        if (attrs != null && attrs.Length > 0)
            return ((DescriptionAttribute)attrs[0]).Description;
    }
    return en.ToString();
}

public enum ActivityType
{
    [Description("Drip Plan Email")]
    DripPlanEmail = 1,
    [Description("Modification")]
    Modification = 2,
    [Description("View")]
    View = 3,
    [Description("E-Alert Sent")]
    EAlertSent = 4,
    [Description("E-Alert View")]
    EAlertView = 5
}

Answer 9

I implemented this extension method to get the description from enum values. It works for all kind of enums.

public static class EnumExtension
{
    public static string ToDescription(this System.Enum value)
    {
        FieldInfo fi = value.GetType().GetField(value.ToString());
        var attributes = (DescriptionAttribute[])fi.GetCustomAttributes(typeof(DescriptionAttribute), false);
        return attributes.Length > 0 ? attributes[0].Description : value.ToString();
    }
}

Answer 10

Here's the .NET Core version of AdamCrawford's answer, using System.Reflection.TypeExtensions;

public static class EnumHelper
{
    /// <summary>
    /// Gets an attribute on an enum field value
    /// </summary>
    /// <typeparam name="T">The type of the attribute you want to retrieve</typeparam>
    /// <param name="enumVal">The enum value</param>
    /// <returns>The attribute of type T that exists on the enum value</returns>
    /// <example>string desc = myEnumVariable.GetAttributeOfType<DescriptionAttribute>().Description;</example>
    public static T GetAttributeOfType<T>(this Enum enumVal) where T : System.Attribute
    {
        var type = enumVal.GetType();
        var memInfo = type.GetMember(enumVal.ToString());
        IEnumerable<Attribute> attributes = memInfo[0].GetCustomAttributes(typeof(T), false);
        return (T)attributes?.ToArray()[0];
    }
}

Answer 11

Adding my solution for Net Framework and NetCore.

I used this for my Net Framework implementation:

public static class EnumerationExtension
{
    public static string Description( this Enum value )
    {
        // get attributes  
        var field = value.GetType().GetField( value.ToString() );
        var attributes = field.GetCustomAttributes( typeof( DescriptionAttribute ), false );

        // return description
        return attributes.Any() ? ( (DescriptionAttribute)attributes.ElementAt( 0 ) ).Description : "Description Not Found";
    }
}

This doesn't work for NetCore so I modified it to do this:

public static class EnumerationExtension
{
    public static string Description( this Enum value )
    {
        // get attributes  
        var field = value.GetType().GetField( value.ToString() );
        var attributes = field.GetCustomAttributes( false );

        // Description is in a hidden Attribute class called DisplayAttribute
        // Not to be confused with DisplayNameAttribute
        dynamic displayAttribute = null;

        if (attributes.Any())
        {
            displayAttribute = attributes.ElementAt( 0 );
        }

        // return description
        return displayAttribute?.Description ?? "Description Not Found";
    }
}

Enumeration Example:

public enum ExportTypes
{
    [Display( Name = "csv", Description = "text/csv" )]
    CSV = 0
}

Sample Usage for either static added:

var myDescription = myEnum.Description();

Answer 12

Taking advantage of some of the newer C# language features, you can reduce the line count:

public static TAttribute GetEnumAttribute<TAttribute>(this Enum enumVal) where TAttribute : Attribute
{
    var memberInfo = enumVal.GetType().GetMember(enumVal.ToString());
    return memberInfo[0].GetCustomAttributes(typeof(TAttribute), false).OfType<TAttribute>().FirstOrDefault();
}

public static string GetEnumDescription(this Enum enumValue) => enumValue.GetEnumAttribute<DescriptionAttribute>()?.Description ?? enumValue.ToString();

Answer 13

I this answer to setup a combo box from an enum attributes which was great.

I then needed to code the reverse so that I can get the selection from the box and return the enum in the correct type.

I also modified the code to handle the case where an attribute was missing

For the benefits of the next person, here is my final solution

public static class Program
{
   static void Main(string[] args)
    {
       // display the description attribute from the enum
       foreach (Colour type in (Colour[])Enum.GetValues(typeof(Colour)))
       {
            Console.WriteLine(EnumExtensions.ToName(type));
       }

       // Get the array from the description
       string xStr = "Yellow";
       Colour thisColour = EnumExtensions.FromName<Colour>(xStr);

       Console.ReadLine();
    }

   public enum Colour
   {
       [Description("Colour Red")]
       Red = 0,

       [Description("Colour Green")]
       Green = 1,

       [Description("Colour Blue")]
       Blue = 2,

       Yellow = 3
   }
}

public static class EnumExtensions
{

    // This extension method is broken out so you can use a similar pattern with 
    // other MetaData elements in the future. This is your base method for each.
    public static T GetAttribute<T>(this Enum value) where T : Attribute
    {
        var type = value.GetType();
        var memberInfo = type.GetMember(value.ToString());
        var attributes = memberInfo[0].GetCustomAttributes(typeof(T), false);

        // check if no attributes have been specified.
        if (((Array)attributes).Length > 0)
        {
            return (T)attributes[0];
        }
        else
        {
            return null;
        }
    }

    // This method creates a specific call to the above method, requesting the
    // Description MetaData attribute.
    public static string ToName(this Enum value)
    {
        var attribute = value.GetAttribute<DescriptionAttribute>();
        return attribute == null ? value.ToString() : attribute.Description;
    }

    /// <summary>
    /// Find the enum from the description attribute.
    /// </summary>
    /// <typeparam name="T"></typeparam>
    /// <param name="desc"></param>
    /// <returns></returns>
    public static T FromName<T>(this string desc) where T : struct
    {
        string attr;
        Boolean found = false;
        T result = (T)Enum.GetValues(typeof(T)).GetValue(0);

        foreach (object enumVal in Enum.GetValues(typeof(T)))
        {
            attr = ((Enum)enumVal).ToName();

            if (attr == desc)
            {
                result = (T)enumVal;
                found = true;
                break;
            }
        }

        if (!found)
        {
            throw new Exception();
        }

        return result;
    }
}

}

Answer 14

This extension method will obtain a string representation of an enum value using its XmlEnumAttribute. If no XmlEnumAttribute is present, it falls back to enum.ToString().

public static string ToStringUsingXmlEnumAttribute<T>(this T enumValue)
    where T: struct, IConvertible
{
    if (!typeof(T).IsEnum)
    {
        throw new ArgumentException("T must be an enumerated type");
    }

    string name;

    var type = typeof(T);

    var memInfo = type.GetMember(enumValue.ToString());

    if (memInfo.Length == 1)
    {
        var attributes = memInfo[0].GetCustomAttributes(typeof(System.Xml.Serialization.XmlEnumAttribute), false);

        if (attributes.Length == 1)
        {
            name = ((System.Xml.Serialization.XmlEnumAttribute)attributes[0]).Name;
        }
        else
        {
            name = enumValue.ToString();
        }
    }
    else
    {
        name = enumValue.ToString();
    }

    return name;
}

Answer 15

And if you want the full list of names you can do something like

typeof (PharmacyConfigurationKeys).GetFields()
        .Where(x => x.GetCustomAttributes(false).Any(y => typeof(DescriptionAttribute) == y.GetType()))
        .Select(x => ((DescriptionAttribute)x.GetCustomAttributes(false)[0]).Description);

Answer 16

If your enum contains a value like Equals you might bump into a few bugs using some extensions in a lot of answers here. This is because it is normally assumed that typeof(YourEnum).GetMember(YourEnum.Value) would return only one value, which is the MemberInfo of your enum. Here's a slightly safer version Adam Crawford's answer.

public static class AttributeExtensions
{
    #region Methods

    public static T GetAttribute<T>(this Enum enumValue) where T : Attribute
    {
        var type = enumValue.GetType();
        var memberInfo = type.GetMember(enumValue.ToString());
        var member = memberInfo.FirstOrDefault(m => m.DeclaringType == type);
        var attribute = Attribute.GetCustomAttribute(member, typeof(T), false);
        return attribute is T ? (T)attribute : null;
    }

    #endregion
}

Answer 17

Guys if it helps I will share with you my solution: Definition of Custom attribute:

    [AttributeUsage(AttributeTargets.Field,AllowMultiple = false)]
public class EnumDisplayName : Attribute
{
    public string Name { get; private set; }
    public EnumDisplayName(string name)
    {
        Name = name;
    }
}

Now because I needed it inside of HtmlHelper definition of HtmlHelper Extension:

public static class EnumHelper
{
    public static string EnumDisplayName(this HtmlHelper helper,EPriceType priceType)
    {
        //Get every fields from enum
        var fields = priceType.GetType().GetFields();
        //Foreach field skipping 1`st fieldw which keeps currently sellected value
        for (int i = 0; i < fields.Length;i++ )
        {
            //find field with same int value
            if ((int)fields[i].GetValue(priceType) == (int)priceType)
            {
                //get attributes of found field
                var attributes = fields[i].GetCustomAttributes(false);
                if (attributes.Length > 0)
                {
                    //return name of found attribute
                    var retAttr = (EnumDisplayName)attributes[0];
                    return retAttr.Name;
                }
            }
        }
        //throw Error if not found
        throw new Exception("Błąd podczas ustalania atrybutów dla typu ceny allegro");
    }
}

Hope it helps

Answer 18

    public enum DataFilters
    {
        [Display(Name= "Equals")]
        Equals = 1,// Display Name and Enum Name are same 
        [Display(Name= "Does Not Equal")]
        DoesNotEqual = 2, // Display Name and Enum Name are different             
    }

Now it will produce error in this case 1 "Equals"

public static string GetDisplayName(this Enum enumValue)
    {
        var enumMember = enumValue.GetType().GetMember(enumValue.ToString()).First();
        return enumMember.GetCustomAttribute<DisplayAttribute>() != null ? enumMember.GetCustomAttribute<DisplayAttribute>().Name : enumMember.Name;
    }

so if it is same return enum name rather than display name because enumMember.GetCustomAttribute() gets null if displayname and enum name are same.....

Answer 19

Alternatively, you could do the following:

Dictionary<FunkyAttributesEnum, string> description = new Dictionary<FunkyAttributesEnum, string>()
    {
      { FunkyAttributesEnum.NameWithoutSpaces1, "Name With Spaces1" },
      { FunkyAttributesEnum.NameWithoutSpaces2, "Name With Spaces2" },
    };

And get the description with the following:

string s = description[FunkyAttributesEnum.NameWithoutSpaces1];

In my opinion this is a more efficient way of doing what you want to accomplish, as no reflection is needed..

Answer 20

You can also define an enum value like Name_Without_Spaces, and when you want a description use Name_Without_Spaces.ToString().Replace('_', ' ') to replace the underscores with spaces.