Test if a variable is a list or tuple

Question

In python, what\'s the best way to test if a variable contains a list or a tuple? (ie. a collection)

Is isinstance() as evil as suggested here? http://w

Answer 1

If you just need to know if you can use the foo[123] notation with the variable, you can check for the existence of a __getitem__ attribute (which is what python calls when you access by index) with hasattr(foo, '__getitem__')