> A lock file is meant to record all the dependencies your code needs to work along with how to install those dependencies.

It's about dependency locking in Python packaging.

Overall it feels like UV is the best thing to happen to python packaging in two decades, but circumventing the endless non productive discussions on peps and instead just building something that works and is fast. In Rust naturally.

The post didn't answer why it took over 4 years.

Why couldn't everyone be flied to the same place and have it all figured out in a week instead of having the process drag on for years?

No worries, it is taking longer to be able to rely on C++ modules for portable code, having Valhala available, or a JIT in CPython, some things take their time to finally become widespread, for various kinds of reasons.