diff --git a/launcher/debug-simc-launcher.in b/launcher/debug-simc-launcher.in
index e631072c46de3faddc2dd8c077b6a3dc58302bbb..3e88220eed5f3f0de944c75eadc0bf0066705d99 100644
--- a/launcher/debug-simc-launcher.in
+++ b/launcher/debug-simc-launcher.in
@@ -51,7 +51,7 @@ tmp_data_path = os.path.basename(data_path)
 tmp_conf_path = os.path.basename(conf_path)
 tmp_conf_name, tmp_conf_ext = os.path.splitext(tmp_conf_path)
 ## make sure our tmp_conf_path ends on '.inp'
-if tmp_conf_ext is '.inp':
+if tmp_conf_ext == '.inp':
     pass
 else:
     tmp_conf_path = '{}.inp'.format(tmp_conf_name)
diff --git a/launcher/simc-launcher.in b/launcher/simc-launcher.in
index 5f6f32c40499bc4c29ec1f9bbddbca1700e21397..ce204f97dddd5c2e5518e75e57bdb337885b21ca 100644
--- a/launcher/simc-launcher.in
+++ b/launcher/simc-launcher.in
@@ -49,7 +49,7 @@ tmp_data_path = os.path.basename(data_path)
 tmp_conf_path = os.path.basename(conf_path)
 tmp_conf_name, tmp_conf_ext = os.path.splitext(tmp_conf_path)
 ## make sure our tmp_conf_path ends on '.inp'
-if tmp_conf_ext is '.inp':
+if tmp_conf_ext == '.inp':
     pass
 else:
     tmp_conf_path = '{}.inp'.format(tmp_conf_name)