[Feature] Do not always include the `changelog.*` files in a package

[mrazauskas]

• I'd be willing to implement this feature (contributing guide)
• This feature is important to have in this repository; a contrib plugin wouldn't do

Describe the user story

Currently yarn npm publish and yarn pack do always include changelog.* files and do not allow to ignore them.

The problem is that the change-log file is always growing and it makes the package install size become larger all the time. For instance, in the jest repo the change-log file takes roughly 310 kB.

Not sure how they publish, but in jests case changelog.md is not included in the published packages. Perhaps because it is a monorepo and they have only a single change-log in the root.

I work on a small project which is not a monorepo and its size is only 238 kB. In this case, yarn npm publish would always include changelog.md. That blows up the install size.

Even when I add optimisations and document them in the change-log file, the published package is getting larger. Although, I wanted to make it smaller. That is rather demotivating.

I mentioned jest, because my project is a CLI tool as well. It is not bundled. Hence the install size is the important measure.

Describe the solution you'd like

Add an option that would allow ignoring changelog.* files.

Describe the drawbacks of your solution

Publishing a package with or without changelog.md makes no difference. I understand a package manager can be opinionated, but still there is no difference, wherever changelog.md is included in a package or not.

Adding an option increases the API surface. If that is not acceptable, simply do not include changelog.md in published packages. Force including is a drawback because all the packages become larger and larger over the time.

Describe alternatives you've considered

To use different name for the file: history.md, releases.md or so.

This works, but at the same time I feel like getting punished, when I name the file changelog.md. I really like Yarn. It is the best of all. Could I use the changelog.md file name without that feeling, please?

Or I am pushed to use npm publish. But I do not like some aspects of its behaviour.

Or I could write a script that would pack and publish the package just like yarn npm publish does, but without including changelog.md. Honestly, sounds like dream!

[arcanis]

It was inherited from Yarn 1, which I think inherited it from npm:
https://github.com/yarnpkg/yarn/blob/7cafa512a777048ce0b666080a24e80aae3d66a9/src/cli/commands/pack.js#L50

I don't have a very strong opinion on this - although just a small note the size isn't really an issue in PnP installs since the files won't be unpacked to disk, and text files are typically trivial to compress.

[mrazauskas]

Shall I open a PR removing these pattern? (Feel free to merge without rush, at any comfortable time.)

[mrazauskas]

I think inherited it from npm

Right, seems like they removed this behaviour in npm/npm-packlist#61 (or that’s something else?)

[arcanis]

That seems like it indeed; I'm ok to remove it, but note it'll have to wait the next major, which may take some time.

[mrazauskas]

note it'll have to wait the next major, which may take some time.

Understandable. I saw that the change in npm broke someone. The change is trivial, should be easy to maintain the PR for long time.

Thank you for quick and constructive response.

[clemyan]

Hmm... npm's current docs still lists CHANGELOG as never ignored. I guess they didn't update that when they made the change?

[mrazauskas]

Funny. Click a link at the bottom of that section:

See package.json for more info on what can and can't be ignored.

Scroll to #files. CHANGELOG is not listed there. Seems like an oversight in the Developer Guide (the link you provided).

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UPDATE: They just merged a PR removing the line which was still listing CHANGELOG as never ignored: npm/cli#8295