Enum Classes for Dart

Introduction

Enum Classes provide classes with enum features and are part of Libraries for Object Oriented Dart.

Motivation

Enums are very helpful in modelling the real world: whenever there are a small fixed set of options, an enum is a natural choice. For an object oriented design, though, enums need to be classes. Dart falls short here, so Enum Classes provide what's missing!

Design

• Constants have name and toString, can be used in switch statements, and are real classes that can hold code and implement interfaces
• Generated values method that returns all the enum values in a BuiltSet (immutable set)
• Generated valueOf method that takes a String

Using Enum Classes

Enum Classes use the source_gen library for code generation. The typical way to use it is via a build.dart tool that you create for your project. When you run it, all the generated files are updated.

Here's what you need to do to use Enum Classes:

1. Add a library dependency on enum_class to your pubspec.yaml
2. Add a dev dependency on enum_class_generator to your pubspec.yaml
3. Create a build.dart for your project. See example, below.
4. Run pub run tools/build.dart whenever you need to update the generated files.
5. To make an Enum Class, import package:enum_class/enum_class.dart then extend EnumClass.

See this example for a full project with a build.dart and an enum.

Features and bugs

Please file feature requests and bugs at the issue tracker.