How to get the values of an enum into a SelectList

Question

Imagine I have an enumeration such as this (just as an example):

public enum Direction{
    Horizontal = 0,
    Vertical = 1,
    Diagonal = 2
}

Answer 1

return
            Enum
            .GetNames(typeof(ReceptionNumberType))
            .Where(i => (ReceptionNumberType)(Enum.Parse(typeof(ReceptionNumberType), i.ToString())) < ReceptionNumberType.MCI)
            .Select(i => new
            {
                description = i,
                value = (Enum.Parse(typeof(ReceptionNumberType), i.ToString()))
            });

Answer 2

maybe not an exact answer to the question, but in CRUD scenarios i usually implements something like this:

private void PopulateViewdata4Selectlists(ImportJob job)
{
   ViewData["Fetcher"] = from ImportFetcher d in Enum.GetValues(typeof(ImportFetcher))
                              select new SelectListItem
                              {
                                  Value = ((int)d).ToString(),
                                  Text = d.ToString(),
                                  Selected = job.Fetcher == d
                              };
}

PopulateViewdata4Selectlists is called before View("Create") and View("Edit"), then and in the View:

<%= Html.DropDownList("Fetcher") %>

and that's all..

Answer 3

I have more classes and methods for various reasons:

Enum to collection of items

public static class EnumHelper
{
    public static List<ItemDto> EnumToCollection<T>()
    {
        return (Enum.GetValues(typeof(T)).Cast<int>().Select(
            e => new ItemViewModel
                     {
                         IntKey = e,
                         Value = Enum.GetName(typeof(T), e)
                     })).ToList();
    }
}

Creating selectlist in Controller

int selectedValue = 1; // resolved from anywhere
ViewBag.Currency = new SelectList(EnumHelper.EnumToCollection<Currency>(), "Key", "Value", selectedValue);

MyView.cshtml

@Html.DropDownListFor(x => x.Currency, null, htmlAttributes: new { @class = "form-control" })

Answer 4

This is what I have just made and personally I think its sexy:

 public static IEnumerable<SelectListItem> GetEnumSelectList<T>()
        {
            return (Enum.GetValues(typeof(T)).Cast<T>().Select(
                enu => new SelectListItem() { Text = enu.ToString(), Value = enu.ToString() })).ToList();
        }

I am going to do some translation stuff eventually so the Value = enu.ToString() will do a call out to something somewhere.

Answer 5

I wanted to do something very similar to Dann's solution, but I needed the Value to be an int and the text to be the string representation of the Enum. This is what I came up with:

public static IEnumerable<SelectListItem> GetEnumSelectList<T>()
    {
        return (Enum.GetValues(typeof(T)).Cast<int>().Select(e => new SelectListItem() { Text = Enum.GetName(typeof(T), e), Value = e.ToString() })).ToList();
    }

Answer 6

    public static SelectList ToSelectList<TEnum>(this TEnum enumObj) where TEnum : struct
    {
        if (!typeof(TEnum).IsEnum) throw new ArgumentException("An Enumeration type is required.", "enumObj");

        var values = from TEnum e in Enum.GetValues(typeof(TEnum)) select new { ID = (int)Enum.Parse(typeof(TEnum), e.ToString()), Name = e.ToString() };
        //var values = from TEnum e in Enum.GetValues(typeof(TEnum)) select new { ID = e, Name = e.ToString() };

        return new SelectList(values, "ID", "Name", enumObj);
    }
    public static SelectList ToSelectList<TEnum>(this TEnum enumObj, string selectedValue) where TEnum : struct
    {
        if (!typeof(TEnum).IsEnum) throw new ArgumentException("An Enumeration type is required.", "enumObj");

        var values = from TEnum e in Enum.GetValues(typeof(TEnum)) select new { ID = (int)Enum.Parse(typeof(TEnum), e.ToString()), Name = e.ToString() };
        //var values = from TEnum e in Enum.GetValues(typeof(TEnum)) select new { ID = e, Name = e.ToString() };
        if (string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(selectedValue))
        {
            return new SelectList(values, "ID", "Name", enumObj);
        }
        else
        {
            return new SelectList(values, "ID", "Name", selectedValue);
        }
    }