Python: Dynamically update a dictionary with varying variable “depth”

Question

I have a dictionary with various variable types - from simple strings to other nested dictionaries several levels deep. I need to create a pointer to a specific key:value pair s

Answer 1

The hard part here is to know whether an index must be used as a string form a mapping of as an integer for a list.

I will first try to process it as an integer index on a list, and revert to a string index of a mapping in case of any exception:

def update_batman_db(key, value):
    keys = key.split('-')  # parse the received key
    ix = batman_db         # initialize a "pointer" to the top most item
    for key in keys[:-1]:  # process up to the last key item
        try:               #  descending in the structure
            i = int(key)
            ix = ix[i]
        except:
            ix = ix[key]
    try:                   # assign the value with last key item
        i = int(keys[-1])
        ix[i] = value
    except:
        ix[keys[-1]] = value