Enumerated data types

An enumeration is a user-defined data type consists of integral constants and each integral constant is give a name. Keyword enum is used to defined enumerated data type.

enum type_name{ value1, value2,...,valueN };

Here, type_name is the name of enumerated data type or tag. And value1, value2,....,valueN are values of type type_name.

By default, value1 will be equal to 0, value2 will be 1 and so on but, the programmer can change the default value.

// Changing the default value of enum elements
enum suit{
    club=0;
    diamonds=10;
    hearts=20;
    spades=3;
};

Declaration of enumerated variable

Above code defines the type of the data but, no any variable is created. Variable of type enum can be created as:

enum boolean{
    false;
    true;
};
enum boolean check;

Here, a variable check is declared which is of type enum boolean.

Example of enumerated type

#include <stdio.h>
enum week{ sunday, monday, tuesday, wednesday, thursday, friday, saturday};
int main(){
    enum week today;
    today=wednesday;
    printf("%d day",today+1);
    return 0;
   }

Output

4 day

You can write any program in C language without the help of enumerations but, enumerations helps in writing clear codes and simplify programming.