http://javarevisited.blogspot.sg/2010/10/what-is-difference-between-enumeration.html
Because sometimes I can't open this page without proper proxy configuration, so I have to copy some content here.
Both Iterator and Enumeration provides way to traverse or navigate through entire collection in Java.
Enumeration is a legacy class and not all Collection supports it e.g. Vector supports Enumeration but ArrayList doesn't.
Only major difference between Enumeration and iterator is Iterator has a remove() method while Enumeration doesn't. Enumeration acts as Read-only interface, because it has the methods only to traverse and fetch the objects, where as by using Iterator we can manipulate the objects like adding and removing the objects from collection e.g. Arraylist.
Also Iterator is more secure and safe as compared to Enumeration because it does not allow other thread to modify the collection object while some thread is iterating over it and throws ConcurrentModificationException.
In Summary both Enumeration and Iterator will give successive elements, but Iterator is new and improved version where method names are shorter, and has new method called remove. Here is a short comparison:
Enumeration
hasMoreElement()
nextElement()
N/AIterator
hasNext()
next()
remove()
So Enumeration is used when ever we want to make Collection objects as Read-only.