Getting enum value from another class via Reflection in C#.NET

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Introduction

Reflection is the process by which a computer program can observe and modify its own structure and behavior. Assemblies contain modules, modules contain types, and types contain members. Reflection provides objects that encapsulate assemblies, modules, and types. You can use reflection to dynamically create an instance of a type, bind the type to an existing object, or get the type from an existing object. You can then invoke the type's methods or access its fields and properties. Typical uses of reflection are details here.

Getting members of an Enum via reflection 

It’s very simple to get the value when enum value taken from same class. In this code enum value has to provide for getting type and the type object can supply the field with GetFields() method. Here the GetFields() method works for reflection. 

Look at this example, 

static void Main(string[] args)
{
    Type enumType = typeof(EnumName);
    FieldInfo[] infos;
    Infos = enumType.GetFields();
    infos = enumType.GetFields(BindingFlags.Public | BindingFlags.Static);
    foreach (FieldInfo fi in infos)
    {
        Console.WriteLine(fi.Name);
    }
}  

 using System;
using System.Collections;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
using System.Reflection;
using System.Text;
namespace ReflectionEnum
{
    public class ClassOne
    {
        public enum EnumName1
        {
            OneValue = 1,
            TwoValue = 2,
            ThreeValue = 3,
            FourValue = 4
        }
        public enum EnumName2
        {
            FiveValue = 500,
            SixValue = 600,
            SevenValue = 700,
            EightValue = 800
        }
    }
}

In that case If I want the enum names then:

Object dynamicObject=new ClassOne();
//get common type 
Type dynamicType = dynamicObject.GetType();
//get member info
MemberInfo[] memberInfos = dynamicType.GetMembers(BindingFlags.Public | BindingFlags.Static);

I could use the class name directly for getting type but here I used to show how to get the type in dynamic selection.

Now, all the methods are now in memberInfos variable. So all the enum name can find if foreach use like this:

foreach (MemberInfo t in memberInfos)
{
   Console.WriteLine(t.Name);
} 

Output:

EnumName1ClassOne
EnumName2ClassOne 

But I needs the values of enum then again I need to use reflection and get the type of enum but problem is I have to get the type from Enum name. But its not possible to get type using GetType() method with enum name only. For that I had to use the Namespace, class then enum name like this format: 

var typeEnums = System.Type.GetType(“Namespace Name” + "." + “Class Name” + "+" + “Enum Name”);

Now it’s very easy to get the enum value’s from typeEnums using GetFields() method.

var fieldsArray = typeEnums.GetFields(BindingFlags.Public | BindingFlags.Static);

foreach (var fInfo in fieldsArray)
{
    var ulngValue = (ulong)Convert.ChangeType(fInfo.GetValue(null), typeof(ulong));
    Console.WriteLine(fInfo.Name.ToString(CultureInfo.InvariantCulture) + ":" + ulngValue.ToStr    ing(CultureInfo.InvariantCulture));
}   

At last my desired output comes:

EnumName1ClassOne 

OneValue : 1
TwoValue : 2
ThreeValue : 3
FourValue : 4
EnumName2ClassOne
FiveValue : 500
SixValue : 600
SevenValue : 700
EightValue : 800  

History

• 21-February-2013