OK thanks, I get that now. I suppose there could be at least two alternatives:

1. use "un-integrated" python code e.g. run a subprocess independently that just runs an external binary / shared lib / etc

2. avoid solutions that do not require a python environment entirely, or, use them in a less-commonly-employed manner that would not run the product through python (e.g. Airflow bash operator)

Both of the above seem perfectly reasonable to me, but I'm not sure whether others would agree.