[Tutor] Getting import to use a variable name

[Ben Finney]

"Jim Mooney Py3.4.3winXP" <cybervigilante at gmail.com> writes:

> I can only use the hardcoded imported module name, shutil in this
> case. If I try x = anothermodule, then import x, it doesn't work.

Can you show an example of Python code that you would like to work?

I am *guessing* you mean you want this to work::

    >>> foo = 'barmodule'
    >>> import foo

That doesn't work because the ‘import’ statement requires the name
directly in the source, not as a string value.

You will be pleased to know of the standard library ‘importlib’
library::

    >>> import importlib

    >>> foo = 'barmodule'
    >>> importlib.import_module(foo)

See the documentation for ‘importlib’ for more on this useful library
<URL:https://docs.python.org/3/library/importlib>.

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Ben Finney