Underlying numeric values in C Sharp (C#) - Mini Project: Build & Apply

Understanding Underlying Numeric Values of Enums in C#

📖 Scenario: Imagine you are creating a simple program to represent different levels of user access in a system. Each access level has a name and an underlying number that the computer uses internally.

🎯 Goal: You will create an enum to represent access levels, then write code to find and display the numeric values behind each level.

📋 What You'll Learn

Create an enum called AccessLevel with exact members: Guest, User, Moderator, Admin

Assign default underlying numeric values to the enum members

Create a variable to hold the enum type

Write a loop to get the numeric value of each enum member

Print the name and numeric value of each enum member

💡 Why This Matters

🌍 Real World

Enums are used in many programs to represent fixed sets of related values, like user roles, days of the week, or status codes.

💼 Career

Understanding enums and their numeric values helps in debugging, working with APIs, and writing clear, maintainable code.

1

Create the AccessLevel enum

Create an enum called AccessLevel with these members exactly: Guest, User, Moderator, Admin. Use default numeric values starting from 0.

C Sharp (C#)

// Your code here

Need a hint?

Enums automatically assign numbers starting at 0 unless you specify otherwise.

2

Create a variable to hold all enum values

Create a variable called levels and set it to Enum.GetValues(typeof(AccessLevel)) to get all enum members.

C Sharp (C#)

enum AccessLevel
{
    Guest,
    User,
    Moderator,
    Admin
}

// Your code here

Need a hint?

This method returns all the enum members so you can loop through them.

3

Loop through enum members and get numeric values

Use a foreach loop with variable level to iterate over levels. Inside the loop, create an int variable called numericValue and set it to the numeric value of level by casting it to int.

C Sharp (C#)

enum AccessLevel
{
    Guest,
    User,
    Moderator,
    Admin
}

var levels = Enum.GetValues(typeof(AccessLevel));

// Your code here

Need a hint?

Casting the enum member to int gives its underlying number.

4

Print each enum member with its numeric value

Inside the foreach loop, add a Console.WriteLine statement to print the enum member name and its numeric value in this format: "Guest = 0".

C Sharp (C#)

enum AccessLevel
{
    Guest,
    User,
    Moderator,
    Admin
}

var levels = Enum.GetValues(typeof(AccessLevel));

foreach (AccessLevel level in levels)
{
    int numericValue = (int)level;
    // Your code here
}

Need a hint?

Use string interpolation with $"{level} = {numericValue}" to print the name and number.