encode()/decode() key parameter type should not be str

The jwt.encode() and jwt.decode() functions declare parameter key to be str. This seems to have been the case for a while, but with new release mypy will now complain that Argument "key" has incompatible type "bytes"; expected "str" [arg-type] when this parameter is given a bytes object.

Giving it a string does not seem to make sense though, the key is inherently binary (and indeed the first thing HMAC does is throw the key into force_bytes: https://github.com/jpadilla/pyjwt/blob/fdfd6871/jwt/algorithms.py#L173-174).

Everything works as intended when you pass in bytes, it’s just the type declaration.

Expected Result

Parameter should accept bytes (and possibly not accept str)

Actual Result

mypy reports a type error when using bytes. When using str it is impossible to pass random bits (since it will be run through .encode('utf-8'))

Reproduction Steps

import secrets
import jwt

secret = secrets.token_bytes(32)
token = jwt.encode(payload={"aud": "foobar"}, key=secret, algorithm="HS256")
result = jwt.decode(
    token,
    key=secret,
    audience="foobar",
    verify=True,
    algorithms=["HS256"],
    options={"require": ["aud"]},
)

Runs fine, but mypy will report errors.

[ps-george]

This still seems to be an issue

[WolfgangFellger]

Yeah, was discussed over in the PR. Seems like the only practical solution at this time is going to Any.