Conda

Conda#

What is Conda#

Conda is an open source package management system and environment management system that runs on Windows, macOS and Linux. Conda quickly installs, runs, and updates packages and their dependencies. Conda easily creates, saves, loads and switches between environments on your local computer. It was created for Python programs, but it can package and distribute software for any language.

How will we use Conda?#

PDAL stands on the shoulders of giants. It uses GDAL, GEOS, and many other dependencies. Because of this, it is very challenging to build it yourself. We could easily burn an entire workshop learning the esoteric build mysteries of PDAL and all of its dependencies. Fortunately, Conda provides us a fully-featured known configuration to run our examples and exercises without having to suffer so much, and provides it for Windows, Linux, and macOS.

Note

Not everyone uses Conda. Another alternative to get a known configuration is to go through the workshop using docker as your platform. A previous edition of the workshop was provided using Docker, but it was found to be a bit too difficult to follow.

Note

PDAL does not have a python wheel package and thus is distributed via conda-forge conda channel. If you would like to know more about the limitations that prevent PDAL from being distributed as a pip package, you can read about it at the pypackaging-native website

Installing Conda Environment (Workshop USB)#

Once mambaforge is installed, open a terminal and navigate to the location of your USB drive
Uncompress the environment, activate it, and use the conda-unpack command

macOS Users

$ mkdir -p "$HOME/mambaforge/envs/pdal-workshop"
$ tar -xzf conda_environments/pdal-workshop_osx-arm64.tar.gz -C "$HOME/mambaforge/envs/pdal-workshop"
$ source "$HOME/mambaforge/envs/pdal-workshop/bin/activate"
(pdal-workshop) $ conda-unpack

Windows Users

> mkdir "%userprofile%\mambaforge\envs\pdal-workshop"
> tar -xvf ./conda_environments/pdal-workshop-win64.zip -C "%userprofile%\mambaforge\envs\pdal-workshop"
> call "%userprofile%\mambaforge\envs\pdal-workshop\scripts\activate"
(pdal-workshop) > conda-unpack

Installing Conda#

Copy the entire contents of your workshop USB key to a PDAL directory in your home directory (something like C:\Users\hobu\PDAL) or the equivalent for your OS. We will refer to this location for the rest of the workshop materials.
Download and install the mambaforge installer for your platform
After installing mambaforge create your workshop by running
```
> conda create -c conda-forge -n pdal-workshop
```
Then activate the new environment
```
> conda activate pdal-workshop
```

Install PDAL, Entwine, and GDAL, and install it from conda-forge

(pdal-workshop) > mamba install -c conda-forge python-pdal gdal entwine matplotlib

Alternatively use the following environment.yml file to create your environment

name: pdal-workshop
channels:
  - conda-forge
dependencies:
  - python=3.11
  - pdal=2.6.2
  - python-pdal
  - gdal
  - untwine
  - geopandas
  - conda-pack
Note

The conda-pack package is used for packaging the pdal-workshop conda environment to go to the USB image, and is not needed otherwise

Using Conda From ArcGIS Pro#

Launch the Python Command Prompt

After launching, create the conda environment for the workshop

> conda create -n pdal-workshop -c conda-forge python=3.11 --yes

Activate the newly created environment
```
> activate pdal-workshop
```
Install pdal
```
> conda install -c conda-forge pdal
```