[lr1970]

> Conda has been a lifesaver for me in the past, but it got so slow in ~2019

This is why mamba [0] was created. It is a C++ reimplementation of conda for much better performance. mamba is a drop-in replacement of conda and can operate on the same anaconda, condaforge (and mambaforge) repositories.

[0] https://github.com/mamba-org/mamba

[sseagull]

I do have to try mamba sometime but I feel like there is something more than python slowness going on.

I use Gentoo and its package manager is written in python. Even though it is more complex (IMO) it doesn’t have nearly the same slowness when it comes to dependency resolution and conflict detection.