Enhanced Enums -- use cases

[Brian Goetz]

Reasonable ideas.  (Note that implementing Enum methods is not simply a 
matter of library code; the compiler generates them, so its a little 
more complicated than "just add a method.")

On 4/12/2017 3:18 AM, Tagir Valeev wrote:
> Speaking about Enum enhancements, what about adding a new static 
> method stream() which returns a stream of all enum values? Current 
> alternatives are Stream.of(MyEnum.values()) and 
> EnumSet.allOf(MyEnum.class).stream(), both allocating additional 
> objects. Having dedicated MyEnum.stream() not only shorter, but could 
> use internal Class.getEnumConstantsShared() directly. What do you think?
>
> With best regards,
> Tagir Valeev.
>
> On Wed, Apr 12, 2017 at 2:11 AM, Brian Goetz <brian.goetz at oracle.com 
> <mailto:brian.goetz at oracle.com>> wrote:
>
>     As you may have noticed, we pushed an implementation of Enhanced
>     Enums some time ago.  We're hoping to get user feedback on the
>     feature as it is now implemented.
>
>     To get things started, here are some typical use cases where
>     generic enums might be useful.  Please contribute others, as well
>     as places in the JDK where code could be refactored using this
>     feature.
>
>     An obvious example is com.sun.tools.javac.code.Dynamic
>     (http://hg.openjdk.java.net/valhalla/valhalla/langtools/file/85cc92a65da8/src/jdk.compiler/share/classes/com/sun/tools/javac/code/Dynamic.java#l51
>     <http://hg.openjdk.java.net/valhalla/valhalla/langtools/file/85cc92a65da8/src/jdk.compiler/share/classes/com/sun/tools/javac/code/Dynamic.java#l51>),
>     where we have an enum that represents the kinds of types
>     representable in the constant pool.
>
>     In that case, these factory methods:
>
>     http://hg.openjdk.java.net/valhalla/valhalla/langtools/file/85cc92a65da8/src/jdk.compiler/share/classes/com/sun/tools/javac/code/Dynamic.java#l137
>     <http://hg.openjdk.java.net/valhalla/valhalla/langtools/file/85cc92a65da8/src/jdk.compiler/share/classes/com/sun/tools/javac/code/Dynamic.java#l137>
>
>     should be collapsible to a single generic method:
>
>         <D> static BootstrapArgument<D> constant(Kind<D> kind, D data).
>
>
>     Another example is command line parsing; for command line
>     arguments, we can represent them as enums whose type represents
>     the type of an (optional) parameter:
>
>         enum Args {
>             QUIET<??>("quiet", "q"),
>             FILE<String>("file", "f"),
>             COUNT<Integer>("count", "c"), ....
>         }
>
>     (though its not obvious what the type arg of QUIET should be.)
>
>
>     If anyone wants to experiment and offer their experience in
>     applying (or misapplying) this feature, either to the JDK or their
>     own codebase, that would be appreciated....
>
>
>