i tried to de-webengine this; but that may not be possible - it appears to be essential - the program will not even start without instantiating a 'WebPage', subclass of 'QWebEnginePage' for the help system - the application even has a CLI option '--no-web-widgets', which i set hard-coded; but webengine is still required at runtime

webengine appears to be used only for the help system - if so, maybe the help system can be removed, with a bit more effort

i will add the WIP patch under abslibre libre-testing/spyder; but i am not going to continue now - it would need deeper surgery to make a libre replacement - for now, i am just going to blacklist it with no replacement

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/usr/bin/spyder", line 33, in <module>
    sys.exit(load_entry_point('spyder==5.4.1', 'gui_scripts', 'spyder')())
  File "/usr/lib/python3.10/site-packages/spyder/app/start.py", line 252, in main
    mainwindow.main(options, args)
  File "/usr/lib/python3.10/site-packages/spyder/app/mainwindow.py", line 1819, in main
    mainwindow = create_window(MainWindow, app, splash, options, args)
  File "/usr/lib/python3.10/site-packages/spyder/app/utils.py", line 289, in create_window
    main.setup()
  File "/usr/lib/python3.10/site-packages/spyder/app/mainwindow.py", line 728, in setup
    internal_plugins = find_internal_plugins()
  File "/usr/lib/python3.10/site-packages/spyder/app/find_plugins.py", line 40, in find_internal_plugins
    mod = importlib.import_module(entry_point.module_name)
  File "/usr/lib/python3.10/importlib/__init__.py", line 126, in import_module
    return _bootstrap._gcd_import(name[level:], package, level)
  File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 1050, in _gcd_import
  File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 1027, in _find_and_load
  File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 1006, in _find_and_load_unlocked
  File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 688, in _load_unlocked
  File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap_external>", line 883, in exec_module
  File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 241, in _call_with_frames_removed
  File "/usr/lib/python3.10/site-packages/spyder/plugins/help/plugin.py", line 26, in <module>
    from spyder.plugins.help.widgets import HelpWidget
  File "/usr/lib/python3.10/site-packages/spyder/plugins/help/widgets.py", line 39, in <module>
    from spyder.widgets.browser import FrameWebView
  File "/usr/lib/python3.10/site-packages/spyder/widgets/browser.py", line 68, in <module>
    class WebPage(QWebEnginePage):
NameError: name 'QWebEnginePage' is not defined

the help system is a plugin (apparently), which means it should be optional; but when i delete the plugin, it still fails; because elsewhere in the program, the "plugin" is strictly required

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/usr/bin/spyder", line 33, in <module>
    sys.exit(load_entry_point('spyder==5.4.1', 'gui_scripts', 'spyder')())
  File "/usr/lib/python3.10/site-packages/spyder/app/start.py", line 252, in main
    mainwindow.main(options, args)
  File "/usr/lib/python3.10/site-packages/spyder/app/mainwindow.py", line 1819, in main
    mainwindow = create_window(MainWindow, app, splash, options, args)
  File "/usr/lib/python3.10/site-packages/spyder/app/utils.py", line 289, in create_window
    main.setup()
  File "/usr/lib/python3.10/site-packages/spyder/app/mainwindow.py", line 728, in setup
    internal_plugins = find_internal_plugins()
  File "/usr/lib/python3.10/site-packages/spyder/app/find_plugins.py", line 40, in find_internal_plugins
    mod = importlib.import_module(entry_point.module_name)
  File "/usr/lib/python3.10/importlib/__init__.py", line 126, in import_module
    return _bootstrap._gcd_import(name[level:], package, level)
  File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 1050, in _gcd_import
  File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 1027, in _find_and_load
  File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 1004, in _find_and_load_unlocked
ModuleNotFoundError: No module named 'spyder.plugins.help.plugin'

FWIW, i saw a patch upstream that makes it require webengine only for python 3 - however python 2 is gone now - its not decided if we should bring it back (#2874)