uv pip install support

[zhougengxian]

uv is a new, fast package management tool. However, faiss can only be installed by conda. For python3.11, it cannot be installed directly now. Please support faiss installation by uv.

$ uv pip install faiss-gpu
× No solution found when resolving dependencies:
╰─▶ Because all versions of faiss-gpu have no wheels with a matching Python ABI tag (e.g., cp311) and you require faiss-gpu, we can conclude that your
requirements are unsatisfiable.

  hint: You require CPython 3.11 (`cp311`), but we only found wheels for `faiss-gpu` (v1.7.2) with the following Python ABI tags: `cp36m`, `cp37m`,
  `cp38`, `cp39`, `cp310`

[mnorris11]

We aim to support pip install offically this half. We have not planned for uv yet.

[knowlen]

I would actually suggest deprecating Conda support entirely. The licensing was changed awhile ago and they've recently taken to sending cold emails to developers demanding subscriptions to continue using the package manager (doesn't seem like they can distinguish between "open source" / miniconda / non-default channels internally)...

Email received from <redacted>@anaconda.com June 2025:

As this is time sensitive, can forward this email to your CIO or IT compliance team, so they are aware?

Our data team here is confident that is using the Anaconda distribution without a license and therefore, you are currently out of compliance.

https://www.anaconda.com/terms-of-service

Please note, If you would like to continue using the software for commercial purposes you are required to purchase a business license.

As open source developers, we should never support package managers that do not align with the values of open source software.

Edit: related, see #3152

[mnorris11]

I would actually suggest deprecating Conda support entirely. The licensing was changed awhile ago and they've recently taken to sending cold emails to developers demanding subscriptions to continue using the package manager (doesn't seem like they can distinguish between "open source" / miniconda / non-default channels internally)...

Email received from <redacted>@anaconda.com June 2025:

As this is time sensitive, can forward this email to your CIO or IT compliance team, so they are aware?
Our data team here is confident that is using the Anaconda distribution without a license and therefore, you are currently out of compliance.
https://www.anaconda.com/terms-of-service
Please note, If you would like to continue using the software for commercial purposes you are required to purchase a business license.

As open source developers, we should never support package managers that do not align with the values of open source software.

Edit: related, see #3152

The conda-forge channel is what we use in Faiss now instead of defaults, and it is indeed free, even after the licensing change.

I moved the Pypi support issue to the 1.14 release, since we planned to work on it this half already. We know pip installation has many more users. Many of the install issues posted here are trying to use pip, even though the official instructions only mention conda. Whether or not that means we deprecate conda is another story. We will consider it though. It would save CI capacity to only test with one package manager.

[knowlen]

@mnorris11 PyPi was always a sensible default, even back when Conda was open source / widely used. I just want to make it known that distributing through Conda in 2025 regardless of the channel (in my experience) can set end users up for these email phishing attacks from the company that is distributing the software.

[mkleinbort-wl]

This would be good. Wheels on PyPi for Arm (i.e. Macs) would be nice.