Enumeration

An enumerated type (also called enumeration or enum, or factor in the R programming language, and a categorical variable in statistics) is a data type consisting of a set of named values called elements, members or enumerators of the type. The enumerator names are usually identifiers that behave as constants in the language. A variable that has been declared as having an enumerated type can be assigned any of the enumerators as a value. In other words, an enumerated type has values that are different from each other, and that can be compared and assigned, but which do not have any particular concrete representation in the computer's memory; compilers and interpreters can represent them arbitrarily.