Using template in complex list variable - ansible

Question

I have a var file like below and the two items don't work the same: the first one is treated as a JSON object and I can access its properties, such as script.name, but it's not the case for the second item which seems to be a plain string.
How can I define the second element of the list in such a way that I can access its properties?
---
file2: script2.j2
scripts_list:
- { name: script1, file: script1.j2 }
- "{ name: script2, file: {{ file2 }} }"
More details - I use the list in a loop like this:
# main.yml
- include_tasks: script.yml
loop: "{{ scripts_list }}"
loop_control:
loop_var: script
# script.yml
- debug:
msg: "loop variable = {{ script }}"
- debug:
msg: "loop variable name = {{ script.name }}"
The first item in the list works fine, but the second returns an error when accessing its name property.
The output seems to show that the first item is treated as a JSON structure whereas the second is just a plain string:
TASK [test : debug] ******************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************
ok: [test] => {
"msg": "loop variable = {u'name': u'script1', u'file': u'script1.j2'}"
}
TASK [test : debug] ******************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************
ok: [test] => {
"msg": "loop variable name = script1"
}
TASK [test : debug] ******************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************
ok: [test] => {
"msg": "loop variable = { name: script2, file: script2.j2 }"
}
TASK [test : debug] ******************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************
fatal: [test]: FAILED! => {"msg": "The task includes an option with an undefined variable. The error was: 'unicode object' has no attribute 'name'\n"}

Answer 1

How can I define the second element of the list in such a way that I can access its properties?
Well IMO the best way to address this since you are defining your scripts info inside a yaml file is to use a yaml definition for all of them and to quote elements with jinja2 templating appropriately.
scripts_list:
- name: script1
file: script1.j2
- name: script2
file: "{{ file2 }}"
If for some reason you want to keep the jsonish definition, the following should work as expected:
scripts_list:
- { name: script1, file: script1.j2 }
- { name: script2, file: "{{ file2 }}" }