How can I eliminate duplicated 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 its 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

You could factor the duplicated code into a CodeableEnumHelper class:

public class CodeableEnumHelper {     public static CodeableEnum getByCode(String code, CodeableEnum[] values) {         for (CodeableEnum e : values) {             if (e.getCode().equalsIgnoreCase(code)) {                 return e;             }         }         return null;     } } 

Each CodeableEnum class would still have to implement a getByCode method, but the actual implementation of the method has at least been centralized to a single place.

public enum IMType implements CodeableEnum {     ...     public IMType getByCode(String code) {         return (IMType)CodeableEnumHelper.getByCode(code, this.values());     }  } 

Answer 2

Abstract enums are potentially very useful (and currently not allowed). But a proposal and prototype exists if you'd like to lobby someone in Sun to add it:

http://freddy33.blogspot.com/2007/11/abstract-enum-ricky-carlson-way.html

Sun RFE:

http://bugs.sun.com/bugdatabase/view_bug.do?bug_id=6570766

Answer 3

To tidy up dave's code:

public class CodeableEnumHelper {
    public static <E extends CodeableEnum> E getByCode(
        String code, E[] values
    ) {
        for (E e : values) {
            if (e.getCode().equalsIgnoreCase(code)) {
                return e;
            }
        }
        return null;
    }
}

public enum IMType implements CodableEnum {
    ...
    public IMType getByCode(String code) {
        return CodeableEnumHelper.getByCode(code, values());
    } 
}

Or more efficiently:

public class CodeableEnumHelper {
    public static <E extends CodeableEnum> Map<String,E> mapByCode(
        E[] values
    ) {
        Map<String,E> map = new HashMap<String,E>();
        for (E e : values) {
            map.put(e.getCode().toLowerCase(Locale.ROOT), value) {
        }
        return map;
    }
}

public enum IMType implements CodableEnum {
    ...
    private static final Map<String,IMType> byCode =
        CodeableEnumHelper.mapByCode(values());
    public IMType getByCode(String code) {
        return byCode.get(code.toLowerCase(Locale.ROOT));
    } 
}