converting string to dict ?

[Fredrik Lundh]

Jason Cunliffe wrote:
> A web input form  passes {'name':'Cleopatra'} as a string.
>
> Please, is there a nice clean function to convert this string to a dict?

>>> eval("{'name': 'Cleopatra'}", {"__builtins__": {}})
{'name': 'Cleopatra'}

the __builtins__ stuff is optional, but provides some protection
from evil data providers:

# from the eff-bot guide

>>> print eval("__import__('os').remove('file')")
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
  File "<string>", line 0, in ?
OSError: [Errno 2] No such file or directory: 'file'

>>> eval("__import__('os').remove('file')", {"__builtins__": {}})
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
  File "<string>", line 0, in ?
NameError: There is no variable named '__import__'

Cheers /F

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