Fix Python urllib.parse.urlencode() TypeError: not a valid non-string sequence or mapping object Error – Python Tutorial

If you are using python urllib.parse.urlencode() to encode a string, you may get this type error.

TypeError: not a valid non-string sequence or mapping object

In this tutorial, we will introduce you how to fix this problem.

Here is an example:

import urllib.request 
n = urllib.parse.urlencode('dive').encode('utf-8')+".png"
print(n)

Run this code, you will get this error:

Why does this type error occur?

Becuase urllib.parse.urlencode() will encode a dict or sequence of two-element tuples into a URL query string. It means you can use this function to encode a python dict or tuples. However, you can not use it to encode a python string.

How to fix this error?

We can use urllib.parse.quote()

import urllib.request 
n = urllib.parse.quote('div good', encoding='utf-8')+".png"
print(n)

If you want to know how to urlencode or urldecode a python string, you can refer:

A Simple Guide to Python urlencode and urldecode for Beginners – Python Tutorial