Can someone explain why enum-vs-string is being discussed as if it is an either-or choice? Why not just call the enum class using the input so that you can supply a string or enum?I understand this would not be a really great choice for a flags enum or int enum, but for single-choice strings, it seems like a reasonable approach to me.

<SNIP>

...in the past, I have used enums like this in my own code mostly as 1. a documentation feature so I can easily remember what the valid choices are, and 2. an easy error catcher since you get a nice exception when you supply an invalid string to the enum class:

>> class MyEnum(Enum):
...  a = "a"
...  b = "b"
...
>>> MyEnum("c")
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>
  File "c:\program files\python39\lib\enum.py", line 384, in __call__
    return cls.__new__(cls, value)
  File "c:\program files\python39\lib\enum.py", line 702, in __new__
    raise ve_exc
ValueError: 'c' is not a valid MyEnum