@Enumerated with non-ordinal enumeration

[jeilong]

Given this enumeration:

public enum Gender {

 MALE ("M"), FEMALE ("F");

 private String codeInDatabase;

 private Gender(String codeInDatabase) {
 this.codeInDatabase = codeInDatabase;
 }

 public String getCodeInDatabase() {
 return codeInDatabase;
 }
}

and this fragment from my POJO:

 @Enumerated(EnumType.STRING)
 @Column(name = "gender")
 public Gender getGender() {
 return gender;
 }
 public void setGender(Gender gender) {
 this.gender = gender;
 }

In the database the column "gender" contains the value M or F. When I query the pojo I get the following exception:

javax.ejb.EJBException: java.lang.IllegalArgumentException:
Unknown name value for enum class com.company.enumeration.Gender: M

Is this a bug? Or is using non-ordinal enumerations not possible at all? I'm using 4.0.5.GA with the EJB3 profile.

[alexg79]

You have misunderstood the way it works.
What if you had multiple attributes, like MALE("M", 1, 2)? How would it work then, hmm??
The answer is that it doesn't -- it uses the enumeration names, such as MALE and FEMALE. Replace "M" and "F" in your database with "MALE" and "FEMALE", respectively.