Determine variable type within django template

Question

I have a variable that I\'m pulling into a table that sometimes is a date and sometimes is a string. If the variable is a date, I want to change the formatting:

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Answer 1

Late to the party, but I just had this problem. The solution I went for is duck-typing, so:

{% if action.extra_column.year %}
  {{ action.extra_column|date:"M y" }}
{% else %}
  {{ action.extra_column }}
{% endif %}

Could you argue that this is definitely not the right way to do it? Probably. Will it get the job done without writing your own template filter and having even more code to maintain? Absolutely.