Json dumping a dict throws TypeError: keys must be a string

Question

I am attempting to convert the following dict into JSON using json.dumps:

 {
     'post_engaged': 36,
     'post_impressions': 491,
     'post_story': 23,
     'comment_count': 6,
     'created_time': '03:02 AM, Sep 30, 2012',
     'message': 'Specialities of Shaktis and Pandavas. \n While having power, why there isn\\u2019t',
     < built - in function id > : '471662059541196',
     'status_type': 'status',
     'likes_count': 22
 } {
     'post_engaged': 24,
     'text': '30 Sept 2012 Avyakt Murlli ( Dual Voice )',
     'post_story': 8,
     'comment_count': 3,
     'link': 'http:\\/\\/www.youtube.com\\/watch?v=VGmFj8g7JFA&feature=youtube_gdata_player',
     'post_impressions': 307,
     'created_time': '03:04 AM, Sep 30, 2012',
     'message': 'Not available',
     < built - in function id > : '529439300404155',
     'status_type': 'video',
     'likes_count': 7
 } {
     'post_engaged': 37,
     'post_impressions': 447,
     'post_story': 22,
     'comment_count': 4,
     'created_time': '03:11 AM, Sep 30, 2012',
     'message': '30-09-12 \\u092a\\u094d\\u0930\\u093e\\u0924:\\u092e\\u0941\\u0930\\u0932\\u0940 \\u0913\\u0',
     < built - in function id > : '471643246209744',
     'status_type': 'status',
     'likes_count': 20
 } {
     'post_engaged': 36,
     'post_impressions': 423,
     'post_story': 22,
     'comment_count': 0,
     'created_time': '03:04 AM, Sep 29, 2012',
     'message': 'Essence: Sweet children, whenever you have time, earn the true income. Staying i',
     < built - in function id > : '471274672913268',
     'status_type': 'status',
     'likes_count': 20
 } {
     'post_engaged': 16,
     'text': 'Essence Of Murli 29-09-2012',
     'post_story': 5,
     'comment_count': 2,
     'link': 'http:\\/\\/www.youtube.com\\/watch?v=i6OgmbRsJpg&feature=youtube_gdata_player',
     'post_impressions': 291,
     'created_time': '03:04 AM, Sep 29, 2012',
     'message': 'Not available',
     < built - in function id > : '213046588825668',
     'status_type': 'video',
     'likes_count': 5
 }

But it leads me to

TypeError : keys must be a string

The error is likely due to the dict containing, keys like:

 <built-in function id>: '213046588825668'

Can someone please guide me, with how should I remove these elements from the dict?

Answer 1

You could try to clean it up like this:

for key in mydict.keys():
  if type(key) is not str:
    try:
      mydict[str(key)] = mydict[key]
    except:
      try:
        mydict[repr(key)] = mydict[key]
      except:
        pass
    del mydict[key]

This will try to convert any key that is not a string into a string. Any key that could not be converted into a string or represented as a string will be deleted.