conda-merge

Tool for merging Conda (Anaconda) environment files into one file. This is used to merge your application environment file with any other environment file you might need (e.g. unit-tests, debugging, jupyter notebooks) and create a consistent environment without breaking dependencies from the previous environment files.

Installation:

pip install conda-merge

Usage:

conda-merge FILE1 FILE2 ... FILE-N > OUTPUT-FILE

A common problem with multiple environment files is that of pinned dependencies: let’s say environment.yml contains the dependency numpy=1.7, and your dev-environment.yml contains pandas as a dependency. If you sequentially apply the environment files (conda env update -f environment.yml and then conda env update -f dev-environment.yml) numpy will no longer be pinned and will be upgraded to the latest version.

One option to solve it is by using the pinned dependencies file in the environment directory, but this means storing your dependencies in another file which interacts with environment.yml, and makes the dependencies less clear to other users. This script enables you to merge the two environment files and then run only one conda env command to apply the change.