Question

Okay, for whatever reason I can’t seem to figure this little problem out.

I have the following enum:

public enum EFeedType
{
    TypeOne = 1,
    TypeTwo = 2
}

Now, I am going to be getting the numeric value from a database. Well, I need to cast the int value from the DB to the enum type:

EDIT:
The database type is integer, so I do not need to cast from string.
END EDIT

EFeedType feedType = (EFeedType) feedId;

However, when I do this, and pass in value of 2 I get the following error:

Instance validation error: ‘2’ is not a valid value for [Namespace Goes Here].EFeedType.

Any thoughts on what I might be doing wrong or missing?

EDIT
Here is the code I am using:

        //GetFeed will return an int value which is pulled from the database
        int feedId = new FeedEngine().GetFeed("FeedName");
        //Convert the ID to the Enum
        EFeedType feedType = (EFeedType) feedId;
        //Set the User Control FeedType Enum to the enum
        FeedControl.FeedType = feedType;
        //Show the user control
        FeedControl.Visible = true;

EDIT – More Info

Okay, after seeing JSkeet’s response, I see that If my feedId = 1 then it will set the enum value to TypeTwo instead of TypeOne like it should. Maybe I need a Default = 0 value in my enum for this to work? But there has to be a better way, because what if my values are not in sequence.

Answer 1

Your error won’t be coming from the line you showed it on. I strongly suspect it’s coming from this line:

FeedControl.FeedType = feedType;

My guess is that that property is doing some validation – and that it doesn’t know about the relevant value.

EDIT: Note that if you do want to find out if a value is valid, use Enum.IsDefined. Enum.Parse will not throw an exception for an incorrect numeric value, so long as it’s in the right range.

Have you really posted the exact code of the enum? Because if it doesn’t explicitly specify the “= 1” and “= 2” it will autoincrement from 0, and that will be your problem.

If you could demonstrate all of this with a short but complete program it would really help. There’s no need to go to the database, and no need to do anything with a user control.