[Zope-Coders] unicode question

[Guido van Rossum]

> Or even this:
> 
>    if type(names) in (types.StringType, types.UnicodeType):
>        names=(names,)

No!

> Although, I'm sure using isinstance is better than comparing types.

Indeed.  Using isinstance is VERY important with an eye on migrating
to new-style types/classes in Python 2.2: the argument could be a
subclass of types.StringType, and then tests using "type(x) is T" or
"type(x) in T" will fail.  The isinstance(x, T) test will succeed
though.

(I'm still thinking about whether to provide a common base for str and
unicode; the more I see this kind of examples, the more I think there
should be one.  But what to call it?  abstractstring?  String?  string?)

--Guido van Rossum (home page: http://www.python.org/~guido/)