namespaces for enum types - best practices

Question

Often, one needs several enumerated types together. Sometimes, one has a name clash. Two solutions to this come to mind: use a namespace, or use \'larger\' enum element na

Answer 1

I would definitely avoid using a class for this; use a namespace instead. The question boils down to whether to use a namespace or to use unique ids for the enum values. Personally, I'd use a namespace so that my ids could be shorter and hopefully more self-explanatory. Then application code could use a 'using namespace' directive and make everything more readable.

From your example above:

using namespace Colors;

void setPenColor( const e c ) {
    switch (c) {
        default: assert(false);
        break; case cRed: //...
        break; case cBlue: //...
        //...
    }
}