String To Dict Problem

[Kamilche]

Hi everyone. I'm trying to convert a string that looks like this:

gid = 'FPS', type = 'Label', pos = [0, 20], text = 'FPS', text2 = 'more
text without quotes', fmtline = "@VALUE @SIGNAL", signals = [('FPS',
None), ('FPS2', 'something')]

to a dict that looks like this:

{'signals': [('FPS', None), ('FPS2', 'something')], 'text': 'FPS',
'pos': [0, 20], 'text2': 'more text without quotes', 'gid': 'FPS',
'type': 'Label', 'fmtline': '@VALUE @SIGNAL'}

I've got a home-rolled routine that was 'good enough', until I added
the list of tuples in there. Now it's failing. I have a hack to
'special case' it, but you know that will come up to bite me in the
future.

Does anyone have a thought on how I can turn what are basically
function keyword arguments in string form, to a dict, without using
exec or eval?

--Kamilche