mamba search --json slow?

[ericpre]

It seems that mamba search --json is significantly slower than mamba search: ~1 min 30s versus 3-4 s for mamba search. Is it expected?
The difference between the two seems to be the output format only.

See mamba-org/gator#132 for background: in short, this is slowing down retrieving packages in gator.

[wolfv]

Mamba search is actually the exact same implementation as conda. Can you check if it's the same there? We have a

Mamba repoquery search function implemented in C++ that might be faster

[ericpre]

It is possible to get the list of all packages as json using mamba repoquery search? It seems that it is necessary to specify a package. If I naively try mamba repoquery search, I get the following error:

mamba repoquery search: error: the following arguments are required: package_query

[wolfv]

What do you mean, all packages? Why not use the repodata.json directly in that case?

You can use "*" maybe?

[ericpre]

Yes, mamba repoquery search "*" --json seems to be providing a similar output as mamba search --json but much faster! I have tried * before but I was missing the quotation marks.
I don't know the details and I was surprised that getting the output as json would make it significantly slower but I agree that using repodata.json may be a more sensible/efficient approach.

[ericpre]

Closing because mamba repoquery search "*" --json is a good alternative.