docs: def check_json(json_type):
          """
          Checks whether json_type is a dict or a string. If it is already a dict, it is returned as-is.
          If it is not, it is converted to a dict by means of json.loads(json_type)
          :param json_type:
          :return:
          """
          try:
              str_types = (str, unicode)
          except NameError:
              str_types = (str,)
  
          if type(json_type) == dict:
              return json_type
          elif type(json_type) in str_types:
              return json.loads(json_type)
          else:
              raise ValueError("json_type should be a json dict or string.")