grunt-express-server with contrib-watch

Question

I am trying to use both `grunt-express-server` and `grunt-contrib-watch` however, as soon as my express server starts, it no longer seems to do any watching or reloading. I have the server setup to spawn in the background. My project is here: https://github.com/RyanHirsch/firem Here is my Gruntfile.js ``` module.exports = function(grunt) { require('load-grunt-tasks')(grunt); // Project configuration. grunt.initConfig({ watch: { options: { livereload: true, }, express: { files: [ 'index.html', 'server.js' ], tasks: [ 'express:dev' ], options: { spawn: false } } }, express: { options: { // Override defaults here }, dev: { options: { script: 'server.js' } } } }); grunt.registerTask('default', ['express:dev','watch']); }; ```

Accepted Answer

I was able to clone your project and able to get everything running with the following tweak in `server.js`:

```
app.listen(3000);
```

into:

```
app.listen(3000, function() {
  console.log('Server listening on port 3000');
});
```

According to the grunt-express-server's "Usage" docs, your server should `console.log` some output so that the grunt task can tell that the server has started successfully.

(This is because starting the server is asynchronous, which can cause a race-condition with LiveReload)

Otherwise, there is a `delay` option for purists who don't want any output from their application :)

grunt-express-server with contrib-watch

Solution

Problem