[python/conda#2] Linux Installation: Path Length issue?

[chung-salomon]

Solution to issue cannot be found in the documentation.

• I checked the documentation.

Issue

Dear Miniforge Maintainers & Developers,

TL;DR

Miniforge loading seems to fail with a long path, e.g. :

root@8cf77d221884:~# source uranie_project/chung-salomon/miniforge/installer_tests/a___very__long_and_extremely_cumbersome_miniforge_path/bin/activate 
env: 'python': No such file or directory

Test Environment

To carry out my test, I pulled debian Docker image:

$ date
jeu. 25 juin 2026 13:32:03 CEST
$ docker pull debian
Using default tag: latest
latest: Pulling from library/debian
Digest: sha256:d07d1b51c39f51188e60be9b64e6bf769fa94e187f092bc32b91305cfa34ba5a
Status: Image is up to date for debian:latest
docker.io/library/debian:latest

and installed wget:

$ docker run -it debian
root@8cf77d221884:/# cd
root@8cf77d221884:~# apt update
[...]
root@8cf77d221884:~# apt install -y wget
[...]

Miniforge Installations

I downloaded Miniforge:

root@8cf77d221884:~# wget https://github.com/conda-forge/miniforge/releases/latest/download/Miniforge3-Linux-x86_64.sh
--2026-06-25 11:33:39--  https://github.com/conda-forge/miniforge/releases/latest/download/Miniforge3-Linux-x86_64.sh
Resolving github.com (github.com)... [...]
2026-06-25 11:33:43 (30.6 MB/s) - 'Miniforge3-Linux-x86_64.sh' saved [105172629/105172629]

root@8cf77d221884:~# 

root@8cf77d221884:~# sha256sum Miniforge3-Linux-x86_64.sh 
848194851a98903134187fbb4ab50efe87b003e0c0f808f97644b7524a62bf2c  Miniforge3-Linux-x86_64.sh
root@8cf77d221884:~# 

Installation 1: [...]/a__very__long[...]

Here is the first installation with a root path length of 115 characters:

root@8cf77d221884:~# bash Miniforge3-Linux-x86_64.sh -p uranie_project/chung-salomon/miniforge/installer_tests/a__very__long_and_extremely_cumbersome_miniforge_path -b
PREFIX=/root/uranie_project/chung-salomon/miniforge/installer_tests/a__very__long_and_extremely_cumbersome_miniforge_path
[...]
Transaction finished

installation finished.
root@8cf77d221884:~# 

root@8cf77d221884:~# readlink -f uranie_project/chung-salomon/miniforge/installer_tests/a__very__long_and_extremely_cumbersome_miniforge_path | wc -m
115
root@8cf77d221884:~# bash
root@8cf77d221884:~# source uranie_project/chung-salomon/miniforge/installer_tests/a__very__long_and_extremely_cumbersome_miniforge_path/bin/activate 
(base) root@8cf77d221884:~# exit
exit
root@8cf77d221884:~# 

The loading succeeded.

Installation 2: [...]/a___very__long[...]

Here is the second installation with a root path length of 116 characters:

root@8cf77d221884:~# bash Miniforge3-Linux-x86_64.sh -p uranie_project/chung-salomon/miniforge/installer_tests/a___very__long_and_extremely_cumbersome_miniforge_path -b
PREFIX=/root/uranie_project/chung-salomon/miniforge/installer_tests/a___very__long_and_extremely_cumbersome_miniforge_path
[...]
Transaction finished

installation finished.
root@8cf77d221884:~# 

root@8cf77d221884:~# readlink -f uranie_project/chung-salomon/miniforge/installer_tests/a___very__long_and_extremely_cumbersome_miniforge_path | wc -m
116
root@8cf77d221884:~# bash
root@8cf77d221884:~# source uranie_project/chung-salomon/miniforge/installer_tests/a___very__long_and_extremely_cumbersome_miniforge_path/bin/activate 
env: 'python': No such file or directory
root@8cf77d221884:~# exit
exit
root@8cf77d221884:~# 

The loading failed

Discussion

Do you know where this problem could come from?

Best regards,

Installed packages

(base) root@8cf77d221884:~# conda list
# packages in environment at /root/uranie_project/chung-salomon/miniforge/installer_tests/a__very__long_and_extremely_cumbersome_miniforge_path:
#
# Name                     Version          Build                 Channel
_openmp_mutex              4.5              20_gnu                conda-forge
archspec                   0.2.5            pyhd8ed1ab_0          conda-forge
backports.zstd             1.5.0            py313h18e8e13_0       conda-forge
boltons                    25.0.0           pyhd8ed1ab_0          conda-forge
brotli-python              1.2.0            py313hf159716_1       conda-forge
bzip2                      1.0.8            hda65f42_9            conda-forge
c-ares                     1.34.6           hb03c661_0            conda-forge
ca-certificates            2026.5.20        hbd8a1cb_0            conda-forge
certifi                    2026.5.20        pyhd8ed1ab_0          conda-forge
cffi                       2.0.0            py313hf46b229_1       conda-forge
charset-normalizer         3.4.7            pyhd8ed1ab_0          conda-forge
conda                      26.3.2           py313h78bf25f_1       conda-forge
conda-libmamba-solver      26.4.2           pyhd8ed1ab_0          conda-forge
conda-package-handling     2.4.0            pyh7900ff3_2          conda-forge
conda-package-streaming    0.12.0           pyhd8ed1ab_0          conda-forge
cpp-expected               1.3.1            h171cf75_0            conda-forge
distro                     1.9.0            pyhd8ed1ab_1          conda-forge
fmt                        12.1.0           hff5e90c_0            conda-forge
frozendict                 2.4.7            py313h07c4f96_0       conda-forge
h2                         4.3.0            pyhcf101f3_0          conda-forge
hpack                      4.1.0            pyhd8ed1ab_0          conda-forge
hyperframe                 6.1.0            pyhd8ed1ab_0          conda-forge
icu                        78.3             h33c6efd_0            conda-forge
idna                       3.17             pyhcf101f3_0          conda-forge
jsonpatch                  1.33             pyhd8ed1ab_1          conda-forge
jsonpointer                3.1.1            pyhcf101f3_0          conda-forge
keyutils                   1.6.3            hb9d3cd8_0            conda-forge
krb5                       1.22.2           ha1258a1_0            conda-forge
ld_impl_linux-64           2.45.1           default_hbd61a6d_102  conda-forge
libarchive                 3.8.7            gpl_hc2c16d8_101      conda-forge
libcurl                    8.20.0           hcf29cc6_0            conda-forge
libedit                    3.1.20250104     pl5321h7949ede_0      conda-forge
libev                      4.33             hd590300_2            conda-forge
libexpat                   2.8.1            hecca717_0            conda-forge
libffi                     3.5.2            h3435931_0            conda-forge
libgcc                     15.2.0           he0feb66_19           conda-forge
libgcc-ng                  15.2.0           h69a702a_19           conda-forge
libgomp                    15.2.0           he0feb66_19           conda-forge
libiconv                   1.18             h3b78370_2            conda-forge
liblzma                    5.8.3            hb03c661_0            conda-forge
libmamba                   2.5.0            hd28c85e_0            conda-forge
libmamba-spdlog            2.5.0            h12fcf84_0            conda-forge
libmambapy                 2.5.0            py313h4616538_0       conda-forge
libmpdec                   4.0.0            hb03c661_1            conda-forge
libnghttp2                 1.68.1           h877daf1_0            conda-forge
libsolv                    0.7.39           h9463b59_0            conda-forge
libsqlite                  3.53.1           h0c1763c_0            conda-forge
libssh2                    1.11.1           hcf80075_0            conda-forge
libstdcxx                  15.2.0           h934c35e_19           conda-forge
libuuid                    2.42.1           h5347b49_0            conda-forge
libxml2                    2.15.3           h49c6c72_0            conda-forge
libxml2-16                 2.15.3           hca6bf5a_0            conda-forge
libzlib                    1.3.2            h25fd6f3_2            conda-forge
lz4-c                      1.10.0           h5888daf_1            conda-forge
lzo                        2.10             h280c20c_1002         conda-forge
mamba                      2.5.0            h9835478_0            conda-forge
menuinst                   2.4.2            py313h78bf25f_0       conda-forge
msgpack-python             1.1.2            py313h7037e92_1       conda-forge
ncurses                    6.6              hdb14827_0            conda-forge
nlohmann_json-abi          3.12.0           h0f90c79_1            conda-forge
openssl                    3.6.2            h35e630c_0            conda-forge
packaging                  26.2             pyhc364b38_0          conda-forge
pip                        26.1.2           pyh145f28c_0          conda-forge
platformdirs               4.10.0           pyhcf101f3_0          conda-forge
pluggy                     1.6.0            pyhf9edf01_1          conda-forge
pybind11-abi               11               hc364b38_1            conda-forge
pycosat                    0.6.6            py313h07c4f96_3       conda-forge
pycparser                  3.0              pyhcf101f3_0          conda-forge
pysocks                    1.7.1            pyha55dd90_7          conda-forge
python                     3.13.13          h6add32d_100_cp313    conda-forge
python_abi                 3.13             8_cp313               conda-forge
readline                   8.3              h853b02a_0            conda-forge
reproc                     14.2.7.post0     hb03c661_1            conda-forge
reproc-cpp                 14.2.7.post0     hecca717_1            conda-forge
requests                   2.34.2           pyhcf101f3_0          conda-forge
ruamel.yaml                0.18.17          py313h54dd161_2       conda-forge
ruamel.yaml.clib           0.2.15           py313h54dd161_1       conda-forge
setuptools                 82.0.1           pyh332efcf_0          conda-forge
simdjson                   4.2.4            hb700be7_0            conda-forge
spdlog                     1.17.0           hab81395_1            conda-forge
tk                         8.6.13           noxft_h366c992_103    conda-forge
tqdm                       4.67.3           pyh8f84b5b_0          conda-forge
truststore                 0.10.4           pyhcf101f3_0          conda-forge
tzdata                     2025c            hc9c84f9_1            conda-forge
urllib3                    2.7.0            pyhd8ed1ab_0          conda-forge
yaml-cpp                   0.8.0            h3f2d84a_0            conda-forge
zstandard                  0.25.0           py313h54dd161_1       conda-forge
zstd                       1.5.7            hb78ec9c_6            conda-forge
(base) root@8cf77d221884:~#

Environment info

(base) root@8cf77d221884:~# conda info

     active environment : base
    active env location : /root/uranie_project/chung-salomon/miniforge/installer_tests/a__very__long_and_extremely_cumbersome_miniforge_path
            shell level : 1
       user config file : /root/.condarc
 populated config files : /root/uranie_project/chung-salomon/miniforge/installer_tests/a__very__long_and_extremely_cumbersome_miniforge_path/.condarc
          conda version : 26.3.2
    conda-build version : not installed
         python version : 3.13.13.final.0
                 solver : libmamba (default)
       virtual packages : __archspec=1=skylake
                          __conda=26.3.2=0
                          __glibc=2.41=0
                          __linux=6.17.0=0
                          __unix=0=0
       base environment : /root/uranie_project/chung-salomon/miniforge/installer_tests/a__very__long_and_extremely_cumbersome_miniforge_path  (writable)
      conda av data dir : /root/uranie_project/chung-salomon/miniforge/installer_tests/a__very__long_and_extremely_cumbersome_miniforge_path/etc/conda
  conda av metadata url : None
           channel URLs : https://conda.anaconda.org/conda-forge/linux-64
                          https://conda.anaconda.org/conda-forge/noarch
          package cache : /root/uranie_project/chung-salomon/miniforge/installer_tests/a__very__long_and_extremely_cumbersome_miniforge_path/pkgs
                          /root/.conda/pkgs
       envs directories : /root/uranie_project/chung-salomon/miniforge/installer_tests/a__very__long_and_extremely_cumbersome_miniforge_path/envs
                          /root/.conda/envs
    temporary directory : /tmp
               platform : linux-64
             user-agent : conda/26.3.2 requests/2.34.2 CPython/3.13.13 Linux/6.17.0-23-generic debian/13.5 glibc/2.41 solver/libmamba conda-libmamba-solver/26.4.2 libmambapy/2.5.0
                UID:GID : 0:0
             netrc file : None
           offline mode : False

(base) root@8cf77d221884:~#

[hmaarrfk]

Is that in fact the long path you used? Or did you use an even longer one for the problem?

[chung-salomon]

Is that in fact the long path you used? Or did you use an even longer one for the problem?

If I understand correctly, here is an excerpt of the original problem on Ubuntu 24:

<username>@<hostname>:/volatile/[...]/r-project/an-introduction-to-r/introduction-and-preliminaries/1/downloads$ readlink -f miniforge/ | wc -m
124

<username>@<hostname>:/volatile/[...]/r-project/an-introduction-to-r/introduction-and-preliminaries/1/downloads$ source miniforge/bin/activate 
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/volatile/.../r-project/an-introduction-to-r/introduction-and-preliminaries/1/downloads/miniforge/bin/conda", line 12, in <module>
    from conda.cli import main
ModuleNotFoundError: No module named 'conda'
<username>@<hostname>:/volatile/[...]/r-project/an-introduction-to-r/introduction-and-preliminaries/1/downloads$ 

Then I tried to find the minimal path length triggering the issue.

Sorry, I didn't say the error message is different on a "real" computer.

Regards,

[hmaarrfk]

I think maximum path length can in fact be an issue with conda. When the packages are built. There is an implicit (perhaps explicit in the documentation) limit

[tfietzek]

I recently came along the same issue. It originate in the Python Interpreter path in the "conda" file in the miniforge/bin or miniforge/condabin folder. Interestingly at the edge case of path length, the directory was first correct but overwritten with the incorrect path: /usr/bin/env, when "conda init" was executed.