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Uv is the best thing to happen to the Python ecosystem in a decade

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Re: Uv is the best thing to happen to the Python ecosystem in a decade

#21

Post by kyt »

I must be the odd man out but I am not a fan of uv.

1. It tries to do too many things. Please just do one thing and do it well. It's simultaneously trying to replace pip, pyenv, virtualenv, and ruff in one command.

2. You end up needing to use `uv pip` so it's not even a full replacement for pip.

3. It does not play well with Docker.

4. It adds more complexity. You end up needing to understand all of these new environmental variables: `UV_TOOL_BIN_DIR`, `UV_SYSTEM_PYTHON`, `UV_LINK_MODE`, etc.

Re: Uv is the best thing to happen to the Python ecosystem in a decade

#22

Post by jampekka »

verdverm wrote: post #11

I'd put type annotations and GIL removal above UV without a second thought. UV is still young and I hit some of those growing pains. While it is very nice, I'm not going to put it up there with sliced bread, it's just another package manager among many

Type annotations were introduced in 2008 and even type hints over decade ago in Sept 2015.

Re: Uv is the best thing to happen to the Python ecosystem in a decade

#23

Post by 01HNNWZ0MV43FF »

hollow-moe wrote: post #15

curl|sh and iwr|iex chills my spine, no one should recommend these methods of installation in 2025. I'm against closed computers but I'm also against reckless install. Even without the security concerns these way of installation tends to put files in a whole random places making it hard to manage and cleanup.

Maybe there will be a .deb one day

Re: Uv is the best thing to happen to the Python ecosystem in a decade

#24

Post by zahlman »

curiousgal wrote: post #10

The best thing to happen to the Python ecosystem would be something that unites pip and conda. Conda is not going anywhere given how many packages depend on non-python binaries, especially in enterprise settings.

The standard approach nowadays is to vendor the binaries, as e.g. Numpy does. This works just fine with pip.

I'm interested if you have any technical documentation about how conda environments are structured. It would be nice to be able to interact with them. But I suspect the main problem is that if you use a non-conda tool to put something into a conda environment, there needs to be a way to make conda properly aware of the change. Fundamentally it's the same issue as with trying to use pip in the system environment on Linux, which will interfere with the system package manager (leading to the PEP 668 protections).

Re: Uv is the best thing to happen to the Python ecosystem in a decade

#25

Post by rustystump »

WD-42 wrote: post #16
verdverm wrote: post #11

I'd put type annotations and GIL removal above UV without a second thought. UV is still young and I hit some of those growing pains. While it is very nice, I'm not going to put it up there with sliced bread, it's just another package manager among many

As far as impact on the ecosystem I’d say uv is up there. For the language itself you are right. Curious if you’ve come across any real use cases for Gil-less python. I haven’t yet. Seems like everything that would benefit from it is already written in highly optimized native modules.

I second and third this. I HATE python but uv was what made it usable to me. No other language had such a confusing obnoxious setup to do anything with outside of js land. uv made it sane for me.

Re: Uv is the best thing to happen to the Python ecosystem in a decade

#26

Post by aerhardt »

I'm surprised by how much I prefer prepending "uv" to everything instead of activating environments - which is still naturally an option if that's what floats your boat.

I also like how you can manage Python versions very easily with it. Everything feels very "batteries-included" and yet local to the project.

I still haven't used it long enough to tell whether it avoids the inevitable bi-yearly "debug a Python environment day" but it's shown enough promise to adopt it as a standard in all my new projects.

Re: Uv is the best thing to happen to the Python ecosystem in a decade

#27

Post by defraudbah »

kyt wrote: post #21

I must be the odd man out but I am not a fan of uv. 1. It tries to do too many things. Please just do one thing and do it well. It's simultaneously trying to replace pip, pyenv, virtualenv, and ruff in one command. 2. You end up needing to use `uv pip` so it's not even a full replacement for pip. 3. It does not play well with Docker. 4. It adds more complexity. You end up needing to understand all of these new enviro…

yeah, I've moved away from it too, but that's a great tool. A rush of rust tools is the best thing that happened to python in the decade

Re: Uv is the best thing to happen to the Python ecosystem in a decade

#28

Post by rkomorn »

Hasz wrote: post #17
athorax wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For me the biggest value of uv was replacing pyenv for managing multiple versions of python. So uv replaced pyenv+pyenv-virtualenv+pip

This is it. Later versions of python .11/.12/.13 have significant improvements and differences. Being able to seamlessly test/switch between them is a big QOL improvement. I don't love that UV is basically tied to a for profit company, Astral. I think such core tooling should be tied to the PSF, but that's a minor point. It's partially the issue I have with Conda too.

Didn't Astral get created out of uv (and other tools), though? Isn't it fair for the creators to try and turn it into a sustainable job?

Edit: or was it ruff? Either way. I thought they created the tools first, then the company.

Re: Uv is the best thing to happen to the Python ecosystem in a decade

#29

Post by atonse »

These rust based tools really change the idea of what's possible (when you can get feedback in milliseconds). But I'm trying to figure out what Astral as a company does for revenue. I don't see any paid products on their website. They even have investors.

So far it seems like they have a bunch of these high performance tools. Is this part of an upcoming product suite for python or something? Just curious. I'm not a full-time python developer.

Re: Uv is the best thing to happen to the Python ecosystem in a decade

#30

Post by cdmckay »

andrewstuart wrote: post #5

Venv seems pretty straightforward once you’ve learned the one activate command. I don’t really get that uv solves all these problems ve never encountered. Just make a venv and use it seems to work fine.

Occasionally I have to build Python projects and coming from other languages and package managers, having to deal with a venv is super weird and annoying.
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