Generate new Enum value at runtime [duplicate]

Question

Suppose I have an Enum like this:

public enum BlaEnum{
    BLA1,
    BLA2;

    private static final String BLA_ONE = "bla one";
    private static final String BLA_TWO = "bla two";

    public static String getName(BlaEnum bla) {
        switch(bla) {
            case BLA1: return BLA_ONE;
            case BLA2: return BLA_TWO;
            default: return null;
        }
    }

    public static BlaEnum getBla(String bla) {
        switch(naam) {
            case BLA_ONE: return BLA1;
            case BLA_TWO: return BLA2;
            default: //return new enum value via reflection;
        }
    }
}

How can I, depending on the incoming String, return a new Enum value at runtime? As if there would be an extra value declared:

public enum BlaEnum {
    BLA1, BLA2, EXTRA_BLA
...
}

Answer 1

You can't. Enums are constant.

If you've run into a case in which you need to return a new enum value at runtime, then you should seriously rethink your design. What you probably need is is an actual class, or maybe some catchall enum value like "other".