Binary in C#: Flags in 10 minutes or less

[@riskeys]

I love this Flag bit feature. Ever since I discover this, I always try to use it whenever it fits the situation like for a “Status” column, which before knowing this I just use plain integer. Anyway, I use power of 2 (1, 2, 4, 8, etc) just cuz it works lol…. Nice video sir as always

[@IAmTimCorey]

Thanks for sharing!

[@farzadmf]

Question: what's the point of [Flags] attribute if we need to manually set them "by hand" ourselves? I thought it should somehow take care of setting them to proper binary values based on their order

[@Kar08Mie]

yes, i'm also surprised .NET doesnt manage this automatically for us.

[@IAmTimCorey]

The Flags attribute allows it to be treated as a binary flag rather than an int. That means you can do bitwise operations on the values. It also means that when you do a ToString, it outputs the flag values instead of an int, so “Read, Write” instead of 3. Remember too that you can have an enum variable that has an integer value that isn’t one of the enum options (since it is a combination of two or more values.

[@farzadmf]

@@IAmTimCorey Thanks for the explanation

[@camerontangen2957]

Literally woke up this morning realizing I need to figure out how to use Flags in my own personal project. Thank you!

[@IAmTimCorey]

I am glad it was helpful.

[@randlmorales4890]

What is the highest number of enum values you can use until it becomes better to use a different approach?

[@IAmTimCorey]

You can technically make the enum a long (64 bit), but that’s not really the issue. The issue is practicality. If you get into the 20-item range, you should probably be thinking through your design. It might be time to refactor.

[@Ultimate_Luki]

Thanks for the video. You should do one for how to check whether a flag is set and how to set it and how to toggle it. For example if you use userAccountControl from AD and a user has a value of 2080, how to check whether its enabled.

[@IAmTimCorey]

These are in the queue.

[@princefowzan]

so putting [Flags] before the enum makes it a flag, here, what is this flags?, a class, a type or what? what is this syntax ?

[@halbertwalston]

In this usage, "[Flags]" is an Attribute of the enumerator (System.Attributes).

[@krccmsitp2884]

Instead of shifting (1

[@IAmTimCorey]

Personal preference is fine. For me, I prefer the shorter syntax rather than trying to read the number of zeros.