Question

I have an enum, which looks like

public enum Animal {
  ELEPHANT,
  GIRAFFE,
  TURTLE,
  SNAKE,
  FROG
}

and I want to do something like

Animal frog = Animal.FROG;
Animal snake = Animal.SNAKE;

boolean isFrogAmphibian = frog.isAmphibian(); //true
boolean isSnakeAmphibian = snake.isAmphibian(); //false

boolean isFrogReptile = frog.isReptile(); //false
boolean isSnakeReptile = snake.isReptile(); //true

boolean isFrogMammal = frog.isMammal(); //false
boolean isSnakeMammal = snake.isMammal(); //false

I simplified the example for didactic purposes, but this would be really useful to me for my real life example. Can I do it in Java?

Answer 1

Yes Enum is a class in Java:

public enum Animal 
{
  ELEPHANT(true),
  GIRAFFE(true),
  TURTLE(false),
  SNAKE(false),
  FROG(false);

  private final boolean mammal; 
  private Animal(final boolean mammal) { this.mammal = mammal; }
  public boolean isMammal() { return this.mammal; }
}

but in your case for a real system I would make that an Enum as well since there is a fixed set of types of animals.

public enum Type
{
  AMPHIBIAN,
  MAMMAL,
  REPTILE,
  BIRD
}

public enum Animal 
{
  ELEPHANT(Type.MAMMAL),
  GIRAFFE(Type.MAMMAL),
  TURTLE(Type.REPTILE),
  SNAKE(Type.REPTILE),
  FROG(Type.AMPHIBIAN);

  private final Type type; 
  private Animal(final Type type) { this.type = type; }
  public boolean isMammal() { return this.type == Type.MAMMAL; }
  public boolean isAmphibian() { return this.type == Type.AMPHIBIAN; }
  public boolean isReptile() { return this.type == Type.REPTILE; }
  // etc...
}

Also note that it is important to make any instance variable final as well.

You can find more details about it in the Java Language Specification.