mamba not working on newer miniconda installations

[benoistlaurent]

Description

Miniconda's Mamba is looking for libarchive.13 while Miniconda installs a more recent version.

Error messages

No error on installation.
Errors occur upon running mamba.

On Ubuntu 22.04.3 LTS

$ mamba --help
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/opt/miniconda/bin/mamba", line 7, in <module>
    from mamba.mamba import main
  File "/opt/miniconda/lib/python3.11/site-packages/mamba/mamba.py", line 49, in <module>
    import libmambapy as api
  File "/opt/miniconda/lib/python3.11/site-packages/libmambapy/__init__.py", line 7, in <module>
    raise e
  File "/opt/miniconda/lib/python3.11/site-packages/libmambapy/__init__.py", line 4, in <module>
    from libmambapy.bindings import *  # noqa: F401,F403
    ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
ImportError: libarchive.so.13: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

On Mac OS

❯❯  mamba --help
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/opt/miniconda/bin/mamba", line 7, in <module>
    from mamba.mamba import main
  File "/opt/miniconda/lib/python3.11/site-packages/mamba/mamba.py", line 49, in <module>
    import libmambapy as api
  File "/opt/miniconda/lib/python3.11/site-packages/libmambapy/__init__.py", line 7, in <module>
    raise e
  File "/opt/miniconda/lib/python3.11/site-packages/libmambapy/__init__.py", line 4, in <module>
    from libmambapy.bindings import *  # noqa: F401,F403
    ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
ImportError: dlopen(/opt/miniconda/lib/python3.11/site-packages/libmambapy/bindings.cpython-311-darwin.so, 0x0002): Library not loaded: '@rpath/libarchive.13.dylib'
  Referenced from: '/opt/miniconda/lib/libmamba.2.0.0.dylib'
  Reason: tried: '/opt/miniconda/lib/libarchive.13.dylib' (no such file), '/opt/miniconda/lib/python3.11/site-packages/libmambapy/../../../libarchive.13.dylib' (no such file), '/opt/miniconda/lib/python3.11/site-packages/libmambapy/../../../libarchive.13.dylib' (no such file), '/opt/miniconda/bin/../lib/libarchive.13.dylib' (no such file), '/opt/miniconda/bin/../lib/libarchive.13.dylib' (no such file), '/usr/local/lib/libarchive.13.dylib' (no such file), '/usr/lib/libarchive.13.dylib' (no such file)

Proposed solution

As this is a Miniconda / Mamba problem, it is not mdws responsability to solve it per se.

A workaround would be to use a classic virtualenv (see requirements file attached).
environment-virtualenv.txt

[benoistlaurent]

This bug as been reported in conda issues: conda/conda#13041

[benoistlaurent]

As described in conda/conda#13041, the solution is to use conda + mamba solver.

# Set conda to use mamba for solving package dependancies
conda install -n base conda-libmamba-solver
conda config --set solver libmamba

# Create mdws environment
conda env create -f binder/environment.yml

The README should probably mention this.

[pierrepo]

Thanks @benoistlaurent this is probably the best solution.