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2026-02-18 Conda Ecosystem Meeting

Zoom link · What time is the meeting in my time zone: 5pm, 2pm

Various parts of the conda ecosystem gather on a regular basis. This meeting brings together all of these sub-communities for a community wide call.

Attendees​

  1. BZ: Bas Zalmstra (@baszalmstra), CFC/CS/Prefix.dev
  2. CHL: Cheng H. Lee (@chenghlee), Anaconda/CF core/conda SC
  3. JRG: Jaime Rodríguez-Guerra (@jaimergp), Quansight, CF/C, C/SC
  4. JS: Jakov Smolic (@jsmolic), Quansight
  5. TH: Travis Hathaway (@travishathaway), Anaconda
  6. DG: Dasha Gurova (@dashagurova), Anaconda
  7. SC: Sophia Castellarin (@soapy1), OpenTeams
  8. DJC: Daniel Ching (@carterbox), NVIDIA/CF
  9. MRB: Matthew Becker, CF core
  10. JK: John Kirkham (@jakirkham), NVIDIA/CF/CFC
  11. DY: Dan Yeaw (@danyeaw), Anaconda
  12. HV, Axel Obermeier (@h-vetinari), conda-forge
  13. DH, Daniel Holth (@dholth), Anaconda

Announcements​

From previous meetings​

  • JRG (conda-forge): Idea to request OSS sponsorship for blacksmith.sh runners.
  • JRG: Bug in CEP 19
    • CHL: I think this technically requires a vote since it's a change to specification, but maybe it can be a quick/pro forma one.
    • JRG: To check governance.
  • DH: Plan to discontinue current_repodata.json on conda-forge; it can't be used by modern solvers and is slow to generate.
    • BZ: Prefix does not use it.
    • JRG: Will you stop updating it or remove it altogether?
    • MRB: Follow a deprecation cycle, someone may be opting it explicitly. Brownouts included, if needed.
    • DH: A different option would be to asynchronously generate current_repodata.json (update conda-index to have a separate current_repodata generator, and run in a different VM). Improving repodata.json latency.
  • DH: CEPs regarding development policy for the Python implementation of conda. 14-day comment period has elapsed for "use Python API conventions in conda instead of deprecation policy"; alternate new CEP "retract deprecation policy; move policy to conda developer documentation"
    • HV: Sometimes a deprecation overlaps with a following one, which makes it trickier to move on from. example: https://github.com/conda/conda-build/issues/5840
    • DH: Provided context about how the deprecation policy complicates adding sharded repodata. It is hard to know what the code should be on a first pass. Long deprecation cycles make it hard to fix/improve.
    • JK: How do we want to help DH adding code like this?
    • MRB: Disambiguates deprecation cycle of removing old code where we do want deprecation cycle from new code
    • JRG: Points out the pain of developing under the current deprecation process
    • MRB: Maybe shorten deprecation period and add Python private symbols (like private _func)

New agenda items​

  • JRG: Can someone approve notes from last week please? https://github.com/conda/governance/pull/348
    • CHL: Done!
  • JRG: State of recipe generators: conda skeleton vs. grayskull vs. rattler-build generate vs. (potentially) conda-recipe-manager (there are ideas to build crm bootstrap).
    • R recipes and conda_r_skeleton_helper.
    • WV: pixi-build backends also generate recipes internally so maybe that's also a generator (e.g. with the upcoming R backend)
    • DH: Prototyped conda-skeleton as a separate extracted project.
    • MRB: Supports splitting skeleton from conda-build to be able to work on it separately.
    • JRG: To document existing differences and proceed with skeleton split.
    • CHL: Is anyone using conda skeleton to genereate recipes from rpms and/or luarocks? Otherwise, I'm all in favor of removing that functionality.
      • JRG/MRB/HV: Only in conda-forge, and we copied the code over, adjusting it as needed, to generate from RPMs CDTs
  • HV: staged recipes Zulip channel
    • No opposition to invite Travis as a reviewer trainee.
  • TH: Path to becoming a staged recipe reviewer.
    • Reached out to Jaime a couple months ago.
    • WV: What about having a "sponsor" to shadow and build a 1:1 relationship?
      • DJC: I agree
    • MRB: Agrees with WV, shouldn't take more than a few months.
    • HV: Also able to interact with other reviewers in the aforementioned Zulip channel.
    • JRG: To document this in conda-forge.org
    • JK: We should track this to better assess progress and readiness.
    • MRB: Maybe a reviewer leaderboard
    • HV: Grateful to Travis for wanting to be involved.
  • DJC: __cuda_arch virtual package
  • HV: macOS updates -- native runners for osx-arm64, macOS 11.0
  • HV: status of cirrus experiment
    • CPU builds are super fast, CUDA builds seem to OOM
    • no GPU support on linux-aarch64
    • cirrus is offering OSS projects a 50% discount
    • fixed pricing of pricing cirrus is a big plus (~$75/month for a big runner that can be subdivided)
    • spending needs a vote, but we have existing funds that should be sufficient for a while