March 23, 2026
Fork wars: Python edition
Fyn: An uv fork with new features, bug fixes, stripped telemetry
No tracking, new tricks, and "finally!" vibes—fans cheer while skeptics squint
TLDR: Fyn forks uv to remove tracking and add long‑requested tools like a built‑in shell and easy upgrades. The crowd is split between cheering privacy and fixes, mocking “telemetry” as the headline, nitpicking odd UV_ setting names, and waiting for adoption before switching—because nobody likes yet another tool swap
Fyn just forked off the popular uv tool and slapped a big, shiny label on it: no telemetry. Translation for non-devs: it won’t phone home about your usage. That alone sparked fireworks. One snarky take went viral—“we removed the telemetry” being headline-worthy is either privacy heroism or peak drama, depending on your mood. Meanwhile, fans say Fyn isn’t just politics; it adds what people begged for: a built‑in shell, one‑command upgrades, and a task runner—all while claiming serious speed.
The hottest gripe? uv’s cache allegedly ballooning forever. One commenter called the missing shell and endless cache “maddening,” while another loved uv’s speed but still called the no-cache-limit “crazy.” Fyn leans into fixes (and a manifesto), pitching itself as that single tool to replace a drawer full of Python installers and helpers.
But not everyone’s sprinting to install. A cautious crowd wants “critical mass” before switching—classic “I’ll wait till my friends move” energy. And the naming police showed up: why do new settings start with “UV_” if this is Fyn now? Cue eye rolls and brand‑identity jokes.
Net vibe: a fork with privacy swagger and real quality‑of‑life features, drowned in memes about hoarding caches and “fork-of-the-week” fatigue. Love it or not, the comments are cooking
Key Points
- •Fyn is a Rust-written, independent Python package and project manager built on uv’s foundation, with telemetry removed.
- •It aims to replace multiple tools (pip, pip-tools, pipx, poetry, pyenv, twine, virtualenv) and claims 10–100x speed improvements over pip.
- •Core features include a universal lockfile, built-in task runner (configured in pyproject.toml), virtual environment activation via fyn shell, and dependency upgrades via fyn upgrade.
- •Fyn manages single-file scripts with inline dependency metadata, runs/installs Python-package tools (with fynx for ephemeral runs), and installs/manages multiple Python versions.
- •It offers a pip-compatible interface, Cargo-style workspaces with a global cache for deduplication, cross-platform support (macOS, Linux, Windows), and installation via PyPI (pip/pipx) or from source (cargo).