What is the Python SDK error "type() argument 1 must be string, not unicode"?

 Issue

When initializing the SDK factory object in Python, this exception occurs:

    from splitio import get_factory
  File "build/bdist.macosx-10.13-intel/egg/splitio/__init__.py", line 4, in <module>
  File "build/bdist.macosx-10.13-intel/egg/splitio/factories.py", line 4, in <module>
  File "build/bdist.macosx-10.13-intel/egg/splitio/clients.py", line 8, in <module>
  File "build/bdist.macosx-10.13-intel/egg/splitio/splitters.py", line 6, in <module>
  File "build/bdist.macosx-10.13-intel/egg/splitio/hashfns/__init__.py", line 9, in <module>
  File "build/bdist.macosx-10.13-intel/egg/splitio/splits.py", line 16, in <module>
  File "build/bdist.macosx-10.13-intel/egg/splitio/matchers.py", line 15, in <module>
  File "/Library/Python/2.7/site-packages/enum/__init__.py", line 326, in __call__
    return cls._create_(value, names, module=module, type=type)
  File "/Library/Python/2.7/site-packages/enum/__init__.py", line 434, in _create_
    enum_class = metacls.__new__(metacls, class_name, bases, classdict)
  File "/Library/Python/2.7/site-packages/enum/__init__.py", line 188, in __new__
    enum_class = super(EnumMeta, metacls).__new__(metacls, cls, bases, classdict)
TypeError: type() argument 1 must be string, not unicode
type() argument 1 must be string, not unicode

 Root cause

The Python Split SDK requires enum34 library version 1.1.5 or above, if a lower version of enum34 installed (for example 1.0.x), or the environment is forced to use this version, the exception above is thrown when initializing SDK factory object.

 Solution

Upgrade enum34 to 1.1.5 or above using pip command. As of this article publishing date, the latest version is 1.1.6.

sudo pip install enum34 --upgrade