While I agree about the Zend framework, Symphony and others trying too hard to be full of features, frameworks like Code igniter are really light. Sure for some very very basic projects it might still be too much, but for an actuel interactive websites chances are higher of it missing features than having too many ...
Can you give an exemple of something it does by default that is "pointless crap" ?
Pointless crap is subjective. Zend_SOAP, I imagine, would for many be considered "pointless crap", but having it available means I don't have to go looking for a SOAP library when I need it to interface with a gateway.
People always confuse features with bloat. Disk space is cheap, and these frameworks aren't hurting things by having additional features.
Now, complexity I can get behind, but stop relating complexity to weight or bloat. CI is less complex than ZF because it does substantially less. It requires developers to do more to accomplish the same tasks ZF developers can do a lot faster. However, it takes a lot more work to get to that point.
Personally, I'm glad we have these choices. We can choose the right tool for the job. =)
Can you give an exemple of something it does by default that is "pointless crap" ?