How do I parse a yaml string with python?

Question

I see an API and many examples on how to parse a yaml file but what about a string?

Answer 1

Here is the best way I have seen so far demonstrated with an example:

import yaml  dct = yaml.safe_load(''' name: John age: 30 automobiles: - brand: Honda   type: Odyssey   year: 2018 - brand: Toyota   type: Sienna   year: 2015 ''') assert dct['name'] == 'John' assert dct['age'] == 30 assert len(dct["automobiles"]) == 2 assert dct["automobiles"][0]["brand"] == "Honda" assert dct["automobiles"][1]["year"] == 2015 

Answer 2

You don't need to wrap the string in StringIO, the safe_load method accepts strings:

In [1]: yaml.safe_load("{1: 2}")            Out[1]: {1: 2}