Log stacktrace when a task fails

[jzaefferer]

Grunt 0.4 is terrible about debugging tasks, since it only logs exception messages and throws away the stack. Adding --verbose --debug doesn't make a difference. Grunt should log the exception stacktrace by default, since an exception always is a fatal error, there's no point in hiding that behind options.

See also #578 and my comment there.

[jzaefferer]

So --stack is a really stupid option, took me a while to figure out it exists. Can we get rid of that and make it the default?

[cowboy]

Most grunt users aren't task authors, and they don't want or need to see stack traces. They just want pretty grunt errors.

I'd recommend that you alias grunt='grunt --stack', and then you'll always get stack traces.

I will add a note in the plugin authoring guide about this.

[damassi]

I really feel like there should be a configuration option on the GruntFile which enables developers to turn this on and off without having to resort to the cli. In our office we share Grunt packages across many developers and I feel like it would be unreasonable to ask them to alias the grunt cmd to get proper stack traces.

[shama]

@damassi You could add grunt.option('stack', true); in your gruntfile.

[damassi]

Awesome, that worked perfect. Thank you!

[kumavis]

+1 for making this option on by default

[cvrebert]

+1 for --debug, --verbose, or perhaps both together, implying --stack.

[vladikoff]

@cvrebert tracking in #864

[paulmccallick]

+1 for turning this on by default.

[ain]

👍 for default stack.

[ralphtheninja]

+1 for default or remove it completely.

[j03m]

+1 on default

[okor]

+1 This option by default.

If an author is writing a task for non-authors then it should be up to them to make the call to suppress errors or not.

[bobfields]

I can't think of any reason why this wouldn't be the default. No errors means no stack trace, even with it turned on, same as pretty. Errors give us a place to look, to fix the problem. Even those who are not task authors can report the error to the authors.