Python 2.3b1: RuntimeError using rexec

[Martin v. Löwis]

"Russell E. Owen" <no at spam.invalid> writes:

> I've looked at the what's new and the standard documentation for rexec 
> and it seems normal -- no hint that the module has been deprecated or 
> that one needs to jump through some "yes I know it's dangerous" hoop to 
> use it.

See

http://www.python.org/2.3/highlights.html

The rexec module has been disabled.

> I stumbled across this when testing some existing code. This code uses 
> rexec to convert a string representation of a dictionary to a dictionary 
> as part of reading in font preferences.

There simply is no "safe" way to do that in Python.

> 
> Any suggestion on how to do that without rexec would also be 
> appreciated. (I was quite disappointed that "dict" didn't do it!)

eval should work, but it won't be safe if you cannot trust the string.

Regards,
Martin