How to get the Display Name Attribute of an Enum member via MVC razor code?

Question

I\'ve got a property in my model called \"Promotion\" that its type is a flag enum called \"UserPromotion\". Members of my enum have display attributes set as follows:

Answer 1

For ASP.Net Core 3.0, this worked for me (credit to previous answerers).

My Enum class:

using System;
using System.Linq;
using System.ComponentModel.DataAnnotations;
using System.Reflection;

public class Enums
{
    public enum Duration
    { 
        [Display(Name = "1 Hour")]
        OneHour,
        [Display(Name = "1 Day")]
        OneDay
    }

    // Helper method to display the name of the enum values.
    public static string GetDisplayName(Enum value)
    {
        return value.GetType()?
       .GetMember(value.ToString())?.First()?
       .GetCustomAttribute<DisplayAttribute>()?
       .Name;
    }
}

My View Model Class:

public class MyViewModel
{
    public Duration Duration { get; set; }
}

An example of a razor view displaying a label and a drop-down list. Notice the drop-down list does not require a helper method:

@model IEnumerable<MyViewModel> 

@foreach (var item in Model)
{
    <label asp-for="@item.Duration">@Enums.GetDisplayName(item.Duration)</label>
    <div class="form-group">
        <label asp-for="@item.Duration" class="control-label">Select Duration</label>
        <select asp-for="@item.Duration" class="form-control"
            asp-items="Html.GetEnumSelectList<Enums.Duration>()">
        </select>
    </div>
}

Answer 2

You need to use a bit of reflection in order to access that attribute:

var type = typeof(UserPromotion);
var member = type.GetMember(Model.JobSeeker.Promotion.ToString());
var attributes = member[0].GetCustomAttributes(typeof(DisplayAttribute), false);
var name = ((DisplayAttribute)attributes[0]).Name;

I recommend wrapping this method in a extension method or perform this in a view model.

Answer 3

I tried doing this as an edit but it was rejected; I can't see why.

The above will throw an exception if you call it with an Enum that has a mix of custom attributes and plain items, e.g.

public enum CommentType
{
    All = 1,
    Rent = 2,
    Insurance = 3,
    [Display(Name="Service Charge")]
    ServiceCharge = 4
}

So I've modified the code ever so slightly to check for custom attributes before trying to access them, and use the name if none are found.

using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.ComponentModel.DataAnnotations;
using System.Linq;
using System.Reflection;

public static class EnumHelper<T>
{
    public static IList<T> GetValues(Enum value)
    {
        var enumValues = new List<T>();

        foreach (FieldInfo fi in value.GetType().GetFields(BindingFlags.Static | BindingFlags.Public))
        {
            enumValues.Add((T)Enum.Parse(value.GetType(), fi.Name, false));
        }
        return enumValues;
    }

    public static T Parse(string value)
    {
        return (T)Enum.Parse(typeof(T), value, true);
    }

    public static IList<string> GetNames(Enum value)
    {
        return value.GetType().GetFields(BindingFlags.Static | BindingFlags.Public).Select(fi => fi.Name).ToList();
    }

    public static IList<string> GetDisplayValues(Enum value)
    {
        return GetNames(value).Select(obj => GetDisplayValue(Parse(obj))).ToList();
    }

    private static string lookupResource(Type resourceManagerProvider, string resourceKey)
    {
        foreach (PropertyInfo staticProperty in resourceManagerProvider.GetProperties(BindingFlags.Static | BindingFlags.NonPublic | BindingFlags.Public))
        {
            if (staticProperty.PropertyType == typeof(System.Resources.ResourceManager))
            {
                System.Resources.ResourceManager resourceManager = (System.Resources.ResourceManager)staticProperty.GetValue(null, null);
                return resourceManager.GetString(resourceKey);
            }
        }

        return resourceKey; // Fallback with the key name
    }

    public static string GetDisplayValue(T value)
    {
        var fieldInfo = value.GetType().GetField(value.ToString());

        var descriptionAttributes = fieldInfo.GetCustomAttributes(
            typeof(DisplayAttribute), false) as DisplayAttribute[];

        if (descriptionAttributes.Any() && descriptionAttributes[0].ResourceType != null)
            return lookupResource(descriptionAttributes[0].ResourceType, descriptionAttributes[0].Name);

        if (descriptionAttributes == null) return string.Empty;
        return (descriptionAttributes.Length > 0) ? descriptionAttributes[0].Name : value.ToString();
    }
}

Answer 4

UPDATE

First solution was focused on getting display names from enum. Code below should be exact solution for your problem.

You can use this helper class for enums:

using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.ComponentModel.DataAnnotations;
using System.Linq;
using System.Reflection;

public static class EnumHelper<T>
    where T : struct, Enum // This constraint requires C# 7.3 or later.
{
    public static IList<T> GetValues(Enum value)
    {
        var enumValues = new List<T>();

        foreach (FieldInfo fi in value.GetType().GetFields(BindingFlags.Static | BindingFlags.Public))
        {
            enumValues.Add((T)Enum.Parse(value.GetType(), fi.Name, false));
        }
        return enumValues;
    }

    public static T Parse(string value)
    {
        return (T)Enum.Parse(typeof(T), value, true);
    }

    public static IList<string> GetNames(Enum value)
    {
        return value.GetType().GetFields(BindingFlags.Static | BindingFlags.Public).Select(fi => fi.Name).ToList();
    }

    public static IList<string> GetDisplayValues(Enum value)
    {
        return GetNames(value).Select(obj => GetDisplayValue(Parse(obj))).ToList();
    }

    private static string lookupResource(Type resourceManagerProvider, string resourceKey)
    {
        foreach (PropertyInfo staticProperty in resourceManagerProvider.GetProperties(BindingFlags.Static | BindingFlags.NonPublic | BindingFlags.Public))
        {
            if (staticProperty.PropertyType == typeof(System.Resources.ResourceManager))
            {
                System.Resources.ResourceManager resourceManager = (System.Resources.ResourceManager)staticProperty.GetValue(null, null);
                return resourceManager.GetString(resourceKey);
            }
        }

        return resourceKey; // Fallback with the key name
    }

    public static string GetDisplayValue(T value)
    {
        var fieldInfo = value.GetType().GetField(value.ToString());

        var descriptionAttributes = fieldInfo.GetCustomAttributes(
            typeof(DisplayAttribute), false) as DisplayAttribute[];

        if (descriptionAttributes[0].ResourceType != null)
            return lookupResource(descriptionAttributes[0].ResourceType, descriptionAttributes[0].Name);

        if (descriptionAttributes == null) return string.Empty;
        return (descriptionAttributes.Length > 0) ? descriptionAttributes[0].Name : value.ToString();
    }
}

And then you can use it in your view as following:

<ul>
    @foreach (var value in @EnumHelper<UserPromotion>.GetValues(UserPromotion.None))
    {
         if (value == Model.JobSeeker.Promotion)
        {
            var description = EnumHelper<UserPromotion>.GetDisplayValue(value);
            <li>@Html.DisplayFor(e => description )</li>
        }
    }
</ul>

Hope it helps! :)

Answer 5

Building on Todd's great answer which built on Aydin's great answer, here's a generic extension method that doesn't require any type parameters.

/// <summary>
/// Gets human-readable version of enum.
/// </summary>
/// <returns>DisplayAttribute.Name property of given enum.</returns>
public static string GetDisplayName<T>(this T enumValue) where T : IComparable, IFormattable, IConvertible
{
    if (!typeof(T).IsEnum)
        throw new ArgumentException("Argument must be of type Enum");

    DisplayAttribute displayAttribute = enumValue.GetType()
                                                 .GetMember(enumValue.ToString())
                                                 .First()
                                                 .GetCustomAttribute<DisplayAttribute>();

    string displayName = displayAttribute?.GetName();

    return displayName ?? enumValue.ToString();
}

I needed this for my project because something like the below code, where not every member of the enum has a DisplayAttribute, does not work with Todd's solution:

public class MyClass
{
    public enum MyEnum 
    {
        [Display(Name="ONE")]
        One,
        // No DisplayAttribute
        Two
    }
    public void UseMyEnum()
    {
        MyEnum foo = MyEnum.One;
        MyEnum bar = MyEnum.Two;
        Console.WriteLine(foo.GetDisplayName());
        Console.WriteLine(bar.GetDisplayName());
    }
}
// Output:
//
// ONE
// Two

If this is a complicated solution to a simple problem, please let me know, but this was the fix I used.

Answer 6

I have two solutions for this Question.

1. The first solution is on getting display names from enum.

public enum CourseLocationTypes
{
    [Display(Name = "On Campus")]
    OnCampus,
    [Display(Name = "Online")]
    Online,
    [Display(Name = "Both")]
    Both
}

public static string DisplayName(this Enum value)
{
    Type enumType = value.GetType();
    string enumValue = Enum.GetName(enumType, value);
    MemberInfo member = enumType.GetMember(enumValue)[0];

    object[] attrs = member.GetCustomAttributes(typeof(DisplayAttribute), false);
    string outString = ((DisplayAttribute)attrs[0]).Name;

    if (((DisplayAttribute)attrs[0]).ResourceType != null)
    {
        outString = ((DisplayAttribute)attrs[0]).GetName();
    }

    return outString;
}

<h3 class="product-title white">@Model.CourseLocationType.DisplayName()</h3>

2. The second Solution is on getting display name from enum name but that will be enum split in developer language it's called patch.

public static string SplitOnCapitals(this string text)
{
        var r = new Regex(@"
            (?<=[A-Z])(?=[A-Z][a-z]) |
             (?<=[^A-Z])(?=[A-Z]) |
             (?<=[A-Za-z])(?=[^A-Za-z])", RegexOptions.IgnorePatternWhitespace);

        return r.Replace(text, " ");
}

 <div class="widget-box pt-0">
     @foreach (var item in Enum.GetNames(typeof(CourseLocationType)))
     {
         <label class="pr-2 pt-1">
             @Html.RadioButtonFor(x => x.CourseLocationType, item, new { type = "radio", @class = "iCheckBox control-label" })&nbsp; @item.SplitOnCapitals()
         </label>
     }
     @Html.ValidationMessageFor(x => x.CourseLocationType)
 </div>