Java enum - why use toString instead of name

Question

If you look in the enum api at the method name() it says that:

Returns the name of this enum constant, exactly as declared in its enum declaration.

Answer 1

A practical example when name() and toString() make sense to be different is a pattern where single-valued enum is used to define a singleton. It looks surprisingly at first but makes a lot of sense:

enum SingletonComponent {
    INSTANCE(/*..configuration...*/);

    /* ...behavior... */

    @Override
    String toString() {
      return "SingletonComponent"; // better than default "INSTANCE"
    }
}

In such case:

SingletonComponent myComponent = SingletonComponent.INSTANCE;
assertThat(myComponent.name()).isEqualTo("INSTANCE"); // blah
assertThat(myComponent.toString()).isEqualTo("SingletonComponent"); // better