Why does the remove-composer-require-dev command exist?

[clubdeuce]

I am curious as to what necessitated this command when composer can be run with the --no-dev argument.

[mikeschinkel]

I am curious as to what necessitated this command when composer can be run with the --no-dev argument.

Here are the reasons, in no particular order, why I chose to go the route I went:

1. I wanted to get something working for my own needs on the client projects. I have often struggled to get Composer to do what I need it to do so it was easier just to write the logic than to fight Composer.
2. Composer then becomes a dependency and if it gets updated by the box user for their projects then if could break the API.
3. Composer tends to be pretty slow. Especially the version in the box that has XDEBUG enabled.
4. In general I am finding myself wanting to reduce dependencies that could end up breaking the box through no fault of our own.
5. I don't think we should make maintaining a composer.json file a requirement for people using the box, and if I implemented using Composer then my script would be very different because many of the steps the script takes would be changed if I used composer with --no-dev.
6. I am leaning towards us defining our own equivalent of composer.json (which we could read and then generate a composer.json file) because I find that while Composer has a great DX for framework-level PHP developers it has a horrible DX for WordPress developers who are not also skilled PHP developers but WP developers have to work-around so many of Composer's defaults, and Composer really does not want to accommodate how WP handles things.

That said, I am not set on any direction yet. I have my opinions but they can change. Bottom line the most important answer to your question is my reply #1.