is variable a list?

[Evgeny Roubinchtein]

>>>>> "James" == James Punteney <jamesp at simplypets.com> writes:


    James> Is there some way to determine whether a variable is list
    James> or a string?  Basically I have a variable that I would like
    James> to be able to be a string or a list, but I need some way to
    James> tell which it is.

Besides using the type() function you could also use the types module
and the isinstance() function:

>>> l=[]
>>> s=''
>>> import types
>>> isinstance(l, types.ListType)
1
>>> isinstance(l, types.StringType)
0
>>> isinstance(s, types.StringType)
1
>>> isinstance(s, types.ListType)
0

Hmm, I guess TIMTOWDY _sometimes_ applies to Python :-).

-- 
Evgeny.