expression vs statement

[Skaperen]

given a string with a snippet of Python code, is there an easy way to determine if it is an expression or a statement or group of statements like a script?

[stranac]

Sure, you can try compiling it and see if you get a SyntaxError:

>>> # eval mode can only compile expressions
>>> compile('a = 1', '', 'eval')
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>
  File "", line 1
    a = 1
      ^
SyntaxError: invalid syntax
>>>
>>> # single mode can only compile a single statement
>>> script = '''
... a = 1
... b = 3
... c = a + b'''
>>> compile(script, '', 'single')
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>
  File "", line 2
    a = 1
         ^
SyntaxError: multiple statements found while compiling a single statement
>>>
>>> # exec can compile any valid python code
>>> compile(script, '', 'exec')
<code object <module> at 0x000001EAC0789240, file "", line 2>