DEP: Avoid ESMPy 8.4.*

[DWesl]

ESMPy 8.4.* imports only with old versions of importlib_metadata. With current versions of importlib_metadata, ESMPy fails to import.

Closes #43

Checklist

• Used a personal fork of the feedstock to propose changes
• Bumped the build number (if the version is unchanged)
• Reset the build number to 0 (if the version changed)
• Re-rendered with the latest conda-smithy
• Ensured the license file is being packaged.

[conda-forge-admin]

Hi! This is the friendly automated conda-forge-linting service.

I just wanted to let you know that I linted all conda-recipes in your PR (recipe/meta.yaml) and found it was in an excellent condition.
I do have some suggestions for making it better though...

For recipe/meta.yaml:

• PyPI default URL is now pypi.org, and not pypi.io. You may want to update the default source url.

[conda-forge-admin]

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[aulemahal]

Two notes:

• esmf 8.4 is the last version available to windows users. This PR means that windows users will be stuck with <= 8.3 for the next xESMF releases. I'm not sure of the implications though...

• Looks like the latest xarray causes some problems with xESMF... I'll look into that.

[aulemahal]

I opened a PR for the xarray issue : pangeo-data/xESMF#395

@ocefpaf, I'm not familiar enough with conda packaging:

• Would it be a good idea to pin xarray here. A subsequent release of xESMF 0.8.8 would unpin it. Or should we just wait and release 0.8.8 as soon as possible ?
• Can we make the ESMpy pins condition on importlib_metadata's version or something like that ? The issue is that 8.4 is the most recent version windows users can use.

[ocefpaf]

• Would it be a good idea to pin xarray here. A subsequent release of xESMF 0.8.8 would unpin it. Or should we just wait and release 0.8.8 as soon as possible ?

Yes. That or backport that PR as a patch.

Can we make the ESMpy pins condition on importlib_metadata's version or something like that ? The issue is that 8.4 is the most recent version windows users can use.

Not sure what you mean but if I got it right it will be inconsistent where Windows will be allowed to get the reversion you want to avoid but the other platforms won't. Why is that? What is broken in 8.4 ?

[aulemahal]

it will be inconsistent

I was more thinking of a pin on importlib_metadata which would give a way for windows users to still have consistent envs with 8.4. If we continue as in this PR, it is simply forbidden. The issue with windows is because the conda builds of ESMF broke in 8.5 and devs there have not yet been able to fix them.

[ocefpaf]

I was more thinking of a pin on importlib_metadata which would give a way for windows users to still have consistent envs with 8.4.

I'm not following. Conda doesn't rely on importlib_metadata to solve envs. How will thy be inconsistent?

[aulemahal]

I'm referring to the issue #43. And you know what, windows users will simply have to install previous versions of xesmf if they want esmf 8.4. I do not have the time and energy to solve this in a fancy way.

[aulemahal]

I just released xESMF 0.8.8, I will merge the changes from this branch into the branch updating the conda pacakge.