Prevent torchvision import crashes in HF Jobs

HF base images can include torchvision, and pip uninstall may be blocked by PEP-668 unless break-system-packages is enabled. When Unsloth's dependency resolution downgrades torch, any remaining torchvision can crash transformers/trl imports (torchvision::nms).\n\nSet TRANSFORMERS_NO_TORCHVISION early, opt into PIP_BREAK_SYSTEM_PACKAGES for all pip ops, and uninstall torchvision/torchaudio both before and after Unsloth install so text-only training stays stable.

Constraint: HF Jobs run on externally-managed system Python (PEP-668)\nRejected: Pin torch/torchvision versions | pip resolver still drags heavy CUDA wheels and increases cost\nConfidence: high\nScope-risk: narrow\nDirective: Keep torchvision out of text-only training images unless you also pin torch+torchvision compat\nTested: python -m py_compile ultimate_sota_training.py\nNot-tested: HF Jobs end-to-end run

ultimate_sota_training.py

@@ -45,11 +45,19 @@ def bootstrap_deps() -> None:
     if os.environ.get("SKIP_BOOTSTRAP") == "1":
         return
 
+    # Ensure text-only transformers runs never hard-import torchvision even if it
+    # is present in the base image.
+    os.environ.setdefault("TRANSFORMERS_NO_TORCHVISION", "1")
+
+    # Ubuntu 24.04+ images may mark system Python as "externally managed"
+    # (PEP-668). Prefer an explicit opt-out for all pip ops in ephemeral jobs.
+    os.environ.setdefault("PIP_BREAK_SYSTEM_PACKAGES", "1")
+
     print("📦 Bootstrapping dependencies...")
 
     # Text-only run: torchvision/torchaudio are not required and are a common source
     # of crashes when torch versions shift in container images.
-    _pip(["uninstall", "-y", "torchvision", "torchaudio"], check=False)
+    _pip(["uninstall", "--break-system-packages", "-y", "torchvision", "torchaudio"], check=False)
 
     # Keep these scoped; avoid blanket -U to reduce resolver churn.
     _pip(
@@ -75,6 +83,10 @@ def bootstrap_deps() -> None:
         ]
     )
 
+    # Some dependency resolution paths can reintroduce torchvision. Remove it
+    # again right before importing transformers/trl.
+    _pip(["uninstall", "--break-system-packages", "-y", "torchvision", "torchaudio"], check=False)
+
 
 bootstrap_deps()