String variable as import module specifier

Question

I have tried the following:

>> modname = 'sys'
>> import modname
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<console>", line 1, in <module>
ImportError: No module named modname

Why does import not recognize 'sys' as the name of the module to be imported?

Answer 1

use importlib module if you want to import a module based on a string.

>>> import importlib
>>> mod = importlib.import_module('sys')
>>> mod
<module 'sys' (built-in)>