该版本保留了int(value)等构造函数的语义，并提供了一种简单的方法来定义可接受的字符串值。

def to_bool(value):
    valid = {'true': True, 't': True, '1': True,
             'false': False, 'f': False, '0': False,
             }   

    if isinstance(value, bool):
        return value

    if not isinstance(value, basestring):
        raise ValueError('invalid literal for boolean. Not a string.')

    lower_value = value.lower()
    if lower_value in valid:
        return valid[lower_value]
    else:
        raise ValueError('invalid literal for boolean: "%s"' % value)


# Test cases
assert to_bool('true'), '"true" is True' 
assert to_bool('True'), '"True" is True' 
assert to_bool('TRue'), '"TRue" is True' 
assert to_bool('TRUE'), '"TRUE" is True' 
assert to_bool('T'), '"T" is True' 
assert to_bool('t'), '"t" is True' 
assert to_bool('1'), '"1" is True' 
assert to_bool(True), 'True is True' 
assert to_bool(u'true'), 'unicode "true" is True'

assert to_bool('false') is False, '"false" is False' 
assert to_bool('False') is False, '"False" is False' 
assert to_bool('FAlse') is False, '"FAlse" is False' 
assert to_bool('FALSE') is False, '"FALSE" is False' 
assert to_bool('F') is False, '"F" is False' 
assert to_bool('f') is False, '"f" is False' 
assert to_bool('0') is False, '"0" is False' 
assert to_bool(False) is False, 'False is False'
assert to_bool(u'false') is False, 'unicode "false" is False'

# Expect ValueError to be raised for invalid parameter...
try:
    to_bool('')
    to_bool(12)
    to_bool([])
    to_bool('yes')
    to_bool('FOObar')
except ValueError, e:
    pass

转换为bool类型的通常规则是，一些特殊的字面量(False, 0, 0.0，()，[]，{})为假，然后其他的都为真，所以我推荐如下:

def boolify(val):
    if (isinstance(val, basestring) and bool(val)):
        return not val in ('False', '0', '0.0')
    else:
        return bool(val)

实际上，你只是将字符串与你期望接受的表示true的字符串进行比较，所以你可以这样做:

s == 'True'

或者检查一大堆值:

s.lower() in ['true', '1', 't', 'y', 'yes', 'yeah', 'yup', 'certainly', 'uh-huh']

使用以下物品时请谨慎:

>>> bool("foo")
True
>>> bool("")
False

空字符串的值是False，但其他的值都是True。所以这个不应该用于任何解析目的。

def str2bool(v):
  return v.lower() in ("yes", "true", "t", "1")

然后像这样称呼它:

>>> str2bool("yes")
True
>>> str2bool("no")
False
>>> str2bool("stuff")
False
>>> str2bool("1")
True
>>> str2bool("0")
False

显式处理true和false:

您还可以使函数显式地检查True单词列表和False单词列表。然后，如果它不在两个列表中，则可以抛出异常。

下面是我用来评估字符串真实性的东西:

def as_bool(val):
 if val:
  try:
   if not int(val): val=False
  except: pass
  try:
   if val.lower()=="false": val=False
  except: pass
 return bool(val)

与使用eval的结果大致相同，但更安全。

该版本保留了int(value)等构造函数的语义，并提供了一种简单的方法来定义可接受的字符串值。

def to_bool(value):
    valid = {'true': True, 't': True, '1': True,
             'false': False, 'f': False, '0': False,
             }   

    if isinstance(value, bool):
        return value

    if not isinstance(value, basestring):
        raise ValueError('invalid literal for boolean. Not a string.')

    lower_value = value.lower()
    if lower_value in valid:
        return valid[lower_value]
    else:
        raise ValueError('invalid literal for boolean: "%s"' % value)


# Test cases
assert to_bool('true'), '"true" is True' 
assert to_bool('True'), '"True" is True' 
assert to_bool('TRue'), '"TRue" is True' 
assert to_bool('TRUE'), '"TRUE" is True' 
assert to_bool('T'), '"T" is True' 
assert to_bool('t'), '"t" is True' 
assert to_bool('1'), '"1" is True' 
assert to_bool(True), 'True is True' 
assert to_bool(u'true'), 'unicode "true" is True'

assert to_bool('false') is False, '"false" is False' 
assert to_bool('False') is False, '"False" is False' 
assert to_bool('FAlse') is False, '"FAlse" is False' 
assert to_bool('FALSE') is False, '"FALSE" is False' 
assert to_bool('F') is False, '"F" is False' 
assert to_bool('f') is False, '"f" is False' 
assert to_bool('0') is False, '"0" is False' 
assert to_bool(False) is False, 'False is False'
assert to_bool(u'false') is False, 'unicode "false" is False'

# Expect ValueError to be raised for invalid parameter...
try:
    to_bool('')
    to_bool(12)
    to_bool([])
    to_bool('yes')
    to_bool('FOObar')
except ValueError, e:
    pass