Read key as specific data type

[jkempe]

Is it possible to select what data type a specific key should be read as?

The case I would like to use this for is to be able to read grb.indicatorOfTypeOfLevel as a long. Not as a string.
Now grb.indicatorOfTypeOfLevel returns 'sfc' but I would like it to return 105.
This can be done in in Eccodes tools by appending :l to the key.
Similar functionality seams to be available for index creation but I can´t see it is possible when reading keys.

Is this currently not possible or have I failed to read the doc properly?

Thanks
Jesper

[shahramn]

In the ecCodes Python3 bindings one can do:
eccodes.codes_get_long(gid, "indicatorOfTypeOfLevel")
and you get back an integer