What are the differences between type() and isinstance()?

Question

What are the differences between these two code fragments?

Using type():

import types

if type(a) is types.DictType:
    do_something(         


        

Answer 1

According to python documentation here is a statement:

8.15. types — Names for built-in types

Starting in Python 2.2, built-in factory functions such as int() and str() are also names for the corresponding types.

So isinstance() should be preferred over type().