> The problem honestly sounds like the codebase itself.
Any reasonably sized codebase is going to load a lot of files. Because your projects are so small that this is not an issue is not a reflection on the quality of every one else's work.
The subject of the conversation: "Given that (a) we need to load files (b) loading files takes time ... do we, consider performance: (1) use an autoloader on some mega-framework; or (2) be explicit and require directly."
I feel this comment contributes nothing to the conversation but a baseless personal accusation.
On the subject of the conversation, we can either let the computer do the work for us or waste time specifying it manually in a way that it's nearly impossible to do as effectively.
The code is already explicit enough, requiring directly is pointless busy-work that is more likely to be wrong.
Any reasonably sized codebase is going to load a lot of files. Because your projects are so small that this is not an issue is not a reflection on the quality of every one else's work.