Java: using switch statement with enum under subclass

Question

First I'll state that I'm much more familiar with enums in C# and it seems like enums in java is a quite mess.

As you can see, I'm trying to use a switch statement @ enums in my next example but I always get an error no matter what I'm doing.

The error I receive is:

The qualified case label SomeClass.AnotherClass.MyEnum.VALUE_A must be replaced with the unqualified enum constant VALUE_A

The thing is I quite understand the error but I can't just write the VALUE_A since the enum is located in another sub-class. Is there a way to solve this problem? And why is it happening in Java?

//Main Class
public class SomeClass {

    //Sub-Class
    public static class AnotherClass {
        public enum MyEnum {
            VALUE_A, VALUE_B
        }    
        public MyEnum myEnum;
    }

    public void someMethod() { 
        MyEnum enumExample //...

        switch (enumExample) {
            case AnotherClass.MyEnum.VALUE_A: { <-- error on this line
                //..
                break;
            }
        }
    }
}

Answer 1

Change it to this:

switch (enumExample) {
    case VALUE_A: {
        //..
        break;
    }
}

The clue is in the error. You don't need to qualify case labels with the enum type, just its value.

Answer 2

Wrong:

case AnotherClass.MyEnum.VALUE_A

Right:

case VALUE_A:

Answer 3

Java infers automatically the type of the elements in case, so the labels must be unqualified.

int i;
switch(i) {
   case 5: // <- integer is expected
}
MyEnum e;
switch (e) {
   case VALUE_A: // <- an element of the enumeration is expected
}