Fix pip "error: externally-managed-environment" on Ubuntu 24.04 / Debian 12

The problem

On a fresh Ubuntu 24.04 box, pip install requests refused:

error: externally-managed-environment

× This environment is externally managed
╰─> To install Python packages system-wide, try apt install
    python3-requests ...

PEP 668 marks the system interpreter as apt-owned, so pip declines to touch it.

What didn't work

pip install --break-system-packages requests — works once, then the next apt upgrade fights your pip-installed versions and system tooling breaks subtly.
sudo pip install requests — can overwrite files under /usr/lib/python3/dist-packages that apt owns, which is the exact failure the marker exists to prevent.
Deleting /usr/lib/python3.12/EXTERNALLY-MANAGED — "fixes" it until the next python3 update restores the file, and now nothing warns you.

The fix

# fast path (2026): uv — venv + installs ~10x faster than pip
curl -LsSf https://astral.sh/uv/install.sh | sh
uv venv .venv && source .venv/bin/activate
uv pip install requests          # or: uv add requests (writes pyproject + lockfile)

# stdlib fallback, no extra tooling:
python3 -m venv .venv
source .venv/bin/activate
pip install requests

The marker only governs the system site-packages; a virtualenv has its own, so pip is unrestricted there while apt keeps owning the system packages.

Why it works

externally-managed-environment protects the interpreter's system site-packages from pip; a venv (or uv-managed project) isolates installs into a private site-packages, which satisfies the PEP 668 guarantee while giving every project its own dependency set.

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