How to eval string/convert string to Expr

Question

Is there a method to convert a string to Expr? I tried the following but it doesn't work:

julia> convert(Expr, "a=2")
ERROR: MethodError: Cannot `convert` an object of type String to an object of type Expr
This may have arisen from a call to the constructor Expr(...),
since type constructors fall back to convert methods.

julia> Expr("a=2")
ERROR: TypeError: Expr: expected Symbol, got String
 in Expr(::Any) at ./boot.jl:279

Answer 1

parse doesn't work here anymore. Now you need Meta.parse:

eval(Meta.parse("a = 2"))

(As pointed out by Markus Hauschel in a comment.)

Answer 2

As Colin said, to convert to Expr (or Symbol) you use parse. And then to evaluate the resulting Expr you use eval. Both together:

julia> eval(parse("a = 2"))
2