I prefer scoop myself. Everything is isolated to the users profile. Check it out.

https://scoop.sh/

Has anyone used GUIX and can give a comparison? I think they are similar ideas but GUIX standardised on Scheme. https://guix.gnu.org/

Perl has copied this as well with Carton. Works really well and as standard keeps the modules in the project dir.

https://metacpan.org/pod/Carton

Not a programmer, but I wrote my first proper script (lots of if/else) at 37 and the world of automation and scripting/programming opened up to me. I work in mostly a Microsoft land, Office 365 and Azure so I work mostly in PowerShell 5 and 7. My daily driver for work is Pop_OS! 20.04 as PowerShell 7 is decently multiplatform now. Current interests/learning are Python and Nim. I don't think you are ever to old to get started.