[racket-dev] should package "X" imply package "X-test"?

On Wed, Oct 16, 2013 at 7:55 AM, Robby Findler
<robby at eecs.northwestern.edu> wrote:
> it would be nice to have a positive rationale for why we suggest leaving
> this particular piece out of "X".

Here's my positive rationale:

First, why include "X-doc"?  I expect that if I tell someone they
should try out Typed Racket, or Slideshow, or Frog, or some other bit
of Racket software, I'll suggest that they do 'raco pkg install X',
for whichever X we're talking about.  This means that 'X' should
contain all the stuff they'd want to use. In particular, I assume that
almost everyone who's intentionally installing 'X' will want X's
documentation.  However, I don't think that everyone will want the
tests -- if they do want the tests, it will be in a situation like you
described, where asking someone to 'raco pkg install X-test' is easy.

But why not just install X-test anyway, in case they need it?  I think
this goes back to why we're not shipping absolutely everything at
once.  There's a cost to a bigger download, whether that's someone
deciding not to download a big file because the file size scares them
off (a real phenomenon), or a network error that wouldn't have
happened with a smaller download, or even actual monetary cost for
someone on a metered network.

Sam