Gruntjs with grunt-nodemon, watch and jshint

Question

I'm trying to run GruntJS with those 3 plugins so it can watch for changes and first: lint the file and then reload express server. My problem with the config below is that if jshint lint the file, nodemon doesn't run and vice versa.

// Gruntfile.js

// our wrapper function (required by grunt and its plugins)
// all configuration goes inside this function
module.exports = function(grunt) {

  // ===========================================================================
  // CONFIGURE GRUNT ===========================================================
  // ===========================================================================
  grunt.initConfig({

    // get the configuration info from package.json ----------------------------
    // this way we can use things like name and version (pkg.name)
    pkg: grunt.file.readJSON('package.json'),

    // all of our configuration will go here

    // configure jshint to validate js files -----------------------------------
  jshint: {
      options: {
        reporter: require('jshint-stylish') // use jshint-stylish to make our errors look and read good
      },

    // when this task is run, lint the Gruntfile and all js files in src
      build: ['Grunfile.js', 'routes/*.js']
    },

    watch: {

      // for scripts, run jshint and uglify
      scripts: {
        files: 'routes/*.js',
        tasks: ['jshint']
      }
    },

    concurrent: {
      dev: {

        tasks: ['jshint', 'nodemon', 'watch'],
        options: {
          logConcurrentOutput: true
        }
      }
    }, // concurrent

    nodemon: {
      dev: {
        script: './server.js'
      }
    } // nodemon


  });

  // ===========================================================================
  // LOAD GRUNT PLUGINS ========================================================
  // ===========================================================================
  // we can only load these if they are in our package.json
  // make sure you have run npm install so our app can find these
  grunt.loadNpmTasks('grunt-contrib-jshint');
  grunt.loadNpmTasks('grunt-contrib-watch');
  grunt.loadNpmTasks('grunt-nodemon');


      grunt.registerTask('default', '', function() {
    var taskList = [
        'jshint',
        'nodemon',
        'watch'
    ];
    grunt.task.run(taskList);
});

};

EDIT (clarification):

The first time that I ran grunt, jshint lint the files, then nodemon start and jshint doesn't lint anymore.

Output:

grunt
Running "default" task

Running "jshint:build" (jshint) task

✔︎ No problems


Running "nodemon:dev" (nodemon) task
[nodemon] v1.2.1
[nodemon] to restart at any time, enter `rs`
[nodemon] watching: *.*
[nodemon] starting `node ./server.js`
Express server listening on port 3000

I remember having similar problems with Grunt, but I've never solved them. You could check out gulp, which handles concurrency much better (everything runs in parallel by default). — jgillich
Sad to hear that, you can always run nodemon in one terminal and grunt in another, but would be really cool if we can just run all the goodies with one tool/command. — mdv

Kelz Kelz · Accepted Answer · 2014-08-01T06:29:18

Try running it as a function task:

grunt.registerTask('default', '', function() {
    var taskList = [
        'jshint',
        'nodemon',
        'watch'
    ];
    grunt.task.run(taskList);
});

EDIT: Another method I've used to achieve the goal of auto rerunning tasks including express, using grunt-express-server, applied to your setup:

module.exports = function(grunt) {
    grunt.initConfig({
        pkg: grunt.file.readJSON("package.json"),
        watch: {
            express: {
                files: ['routes/*.js'],
                tasks: ['jshint', 'express:dev'],
                options: {
                    spawn: false
                }
            }
        },
        express: {
            dev: {
                options: {
                    script: 'app.js',
                }
            }
        },
        jshint: {
            options: {
                node: true
            },
            all: {
                src: ['routes/*.js']
            }
        }
    });

    grunt.loadNpmTasks('grunt-express-server');
    grunt.loadNpmTasks('grunt-contrib-jshint');

    grunt.registerTask('default', '', function() {
        var taskList = [
            'jshint',
            'express:dev',
            'watch'
        ];
        grunt.task.run(taskList);
    });
};

Gruntjs with grunt-nodemon, watch and jshint

2 Answers