How to avoid conda activate base from automatically executing in my VS Code editor?

Question

PS E:\Python and Data Science\PythonDatabase> conda activate base
conda : The term 'conda' is not recognized as the name of a cmdlet, function, script file, or operable program. Check the spelling    
of the name, or if a path was included, verify that the path is correct and try again.
At line:1 char:1
+ conda activate base
+ ~~~~~
    + CategoryInfo          : ObjectNotFound: (conda:String) [], CommandNotFoundException
    + FullyQualifiedErrorId : CommandNotFoundException

PS E:\Python and Data Science\PythonDatabase> & C:/Users/Lenovo/Anaconda3/python.exe "e:/Python and Data Science/PythonDatabase/CourseHelper.py"
Hello World
PS E:\Python and Data Science\PythonDatabase> 

Answer 1

You can set "python.terminal.activateEnvironment": false in your settings to deactivate activation of your environment. Alternatively, you can set "python.condaPath" to where conda exists so the extension can use conda appropriately.

Answer 2

Building on @Brett Cannon's answer...

You have 2 options. Unless otherwise noted, all of the following assume you are changing VSCode Settings (F1 -> Terminal:Configure Terminal Settings).

Option 1

Use the Command Prompt instead of PowerShell.

1. Switch your VSCode terminal to the Command Prompt
2. In the settings.json file, set the "python.condaPath" to your conda.exe. E.g.

"python.condaPath": "C:\\Users\\<user id>\\Anaconda3\\Scripts\\conda.exe"

Option 2

Set the PATH variable.

1. Add the path to conda.exe to your PATH environment variable (per https://stackoverflow.com/a/66259191/11262633):

    "terminal.integrated.env.windows": {
            "PATH": "${env:PATH};C:\\Users\\<user id>\\Anaconda3\\Scripts"
    }

2. Start a PowerShell terminal. You will get a message stating that Conda has not been initialized. Run the following command:

conda init

Note that as of the writing of this answer, conda init --help states that this command is experimental.

MicroSoft states that VSCode doesn't currently support automatically activating Conda environments using PowerShell. However, option 2 seems to work.