How to get the values of an enum into a SelectList

Question

Imagine I have an enumeration such as this (just as an example):

public enum Direction{     Horizontal = 0,     Vertical = 1,     Diagonal = 2 } 

How can I write a routine to get these values into a System.Web.Mvc.SelectList, given that the contents of the enumeration are subject to change in future? I want to get each enumerations name as the option text, and its value as the value text, like this:

<select>     <option value="0">Horizontal</option>     <option value="1">Vertical</option>     <option value="2">Diagonal</option> </select> 

This is the best I can come up with so far:

 public static SelectList GetDirectionSelectList()  {     Array values = Enum.GetValues(typeof(Direction));     List<ListItem> items = new List<ListItem>(values.Length);      foreach (var i in values)     {         items.Add(new ListItem         {             Text = Enum.GetName(typeof(Direction), i),             Value = i.ToString()         });     }      return new SelectList(items);  } 

However this always renders the option text as 'System.Web.Mvc.ListItem'. Debugging through this also shows me that Enum.GetValues() is returning 'Horizontal, Vertical' etc. instead of 0, 1 as I would've expected, which makes me wonder what the difference is between Enum.GetName() and Enum.GetValue().

Answer 1

It's been awhile since I've had to do this, but I think this should work.

var directions = from Direction d in Enum.GetValues(typeof(Direction))            select new { ID = (int)d, Name = d.ToString() }; return new SelectList(directions , "ID", "Name", someSelectedValue); 

Answer 2

There is a new feature in ASP.NET MVC 5.1 for this.

http://www.asp.net/mvc/overview/releases/mvc51-release-notes#Enum

@Html.EnumDropDownListFor(model => model.Direction)