title: freemarker error: expected hash. evaluated instead to freemarker.template.SimpleScalar
body: <p>My template looks like this:</p>
  
  <pre><code>  &lt;#assign senti = "${scmr.results[model]}"&gt;
      &lt;#if senti??&gt;
        &lt;td&gt;${senti} ---- ${senti.sentimentType}&lt;/td&gt;
        &lt;td&gt;${senti.score?html}&lt;/td&gt;
      &lt;/#if&gt;
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>The output looks like this:</p>
  
  <pre><code>POSITIVE(1.0/1) ---- Expected hash. senti evaluated instead to freemarker.template.SimpleScalar on line 5, column 27 in com/addthis/sentiment/sentidemo.ftl.
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>the output text before "----" indicates that <strong>senti</strong> is, indeed, a valid java <strong>Sentiment</strong> object. Methods <strong>getSentimentType</strong> and <strong>getScore</strong> are present and working.</p>
  
  <p>So, why am I getting the error?</p>