Question

I have an enum which I want to get from the web.config at run-time.
I started reading about build providers, but this seems to work for classes.
Can someone point me to an example, or at least point me in the right direction.

Right now I have a comma separated list of values in the web.config, and this is not type-safe and is prone to errors.

If there is another approach to get this type of “dynamic-enum”, I’m open to other ideas.

Thank you!

Answer 1

You can use ConfigurationManager and convert value to enum:

<configuration> 
  <appSettings>
    <add key="YourEnum" value="BlueSky" />  
  </appSettings>
</configuration>

string configValue = ConfigurationManager.AppSettings["YourEnum"];
YourEnumType value = (YourEnumType)Enum.Parse(typeof(YourEnumType), configValue);