fix type-checking of patches to allow dict values + correctly handle patches specified as dict values in --new-pr

[akesandgren]

Required to make PR #3994 complete.

[boegel]

Convert a 'list of dicts and tuples/lists and strings' to a 'list of dicts and tuples and strings'

[akesandgren]

With this in place I now get the below error when trying to do --new-pr on an easyconfig with

patches = [
    {'name': 'AmberTools-20_cmake-locate-netcdf.patch', 'alt_location': 'AmberTools'},
    {'name': 'AmberTools-20_fix_missing_MPI_LIBRARY_error.patch', 'alt_location': 'AmberTools'},

Error:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/usr/lib/python3.8/runpy.py", line 194, in _run_module_as_main
    return _run_code(code, main_globals, None,
  File "/usr/lib/python3.8/runpy.py", line 87, in _run_code
    exec(code, run_globals)
  File "/home/a/ake/Projects/easybuild-dev/easybuild-framework/easybuild/main.py", line 597, in <module>
    main()
  File "/home/a/ake/Projects/easybuild-dev/easybuild-framework/easybuild/main.py", line 496, in main
    new_pr(categorized_paths, ordered_ecs)
  File "/home/a/ake/Projects/easybuild-dev/easybuild-framework/easybuild/tools/github.py", line 1803, in new_pr
    if patch not in paths['patch_files'] and not os.path.isfile(os.path.join(os.path.dirname(ec_path),
  File "/usr/lib/python3.8/posixpath.py", line 90, in join
    genericpath._check_arg_types('join', a, *p)
  File "/usr/lib/python3.8/genericpath.py", line 152, in _check_arg_types
    raise TypeError(f'{funcname}() argument must be str, bytes, or '
TypeError: join() argument must be str, bytes, or os.PathLike object, not 'dict'

Question:
How much checking should be done in new_pr for patches in alt_locations?

[akesandgren]

Regarding testing of this...

• test a full? easyconfig with source and patches in alt_location
• test new-pr with a alt_location enabled patches

Ideas on how? @boegel

[boegel]

@akesandgren Extensive tests that cover the added function, and the overall fixes being implemented here, in 6aa3459, 941886c, 5ace8be