jupyter labextension uninstall deletes federated extensions

[jasongrout]

Description

jupyter labextension uninstall deletes federated extensions, but federated extensions should not be managed by jupyter labextension, since they are managed by other package managers.

Reproduce

conda create -y -n jlab-extension python nodejs
conda activate jlab-extension
pip install --pre jupyterlab
pip install --pre jupyterlab_widgets

This installs the new federated extension for ipywidgets. We can see it in

jupyter labextension list

We can uninstall it with

jupyter labextension uninstall @jupyter-widgets/jupyterlab-manager

Expected behavior

I expect jupyter labextension list to distinguish between federated and non-federated extensions, i.e., extensions installed by labextension and those that are not.

I expect jupyter labextension uninstall to not uninstall federated extensions, since it is not responsible for managing their files and cannot install them. Essentially, by uninstalling by removing the appropriate share directory, you are deleting files installed by a python package without uninstalling the python package, messing things up.

Context

• Operating System and version: macOS Catalina
• JupyterLab version: JLab 3.0rc6