How to output timestamp when node.js server is restarted via grunt-nodemon?

Question

I have simple hello world nodejs express application and I just added grunt-nodemon that should watch changes on *.js files. Here is the console output I get when I run grunt and then change some .js file:

Running "nodemon:dev" (nodemon) task             
[nodemon] v1.3.7                                 
[nodemon] to restart at any time, enter `rs`     
[nodemon] watching: *.*                          
[nodemon] starting `node server.js`              
Example app listening at http://:::3000          
[nodemon] restarting due to changes...           
[nodemon] starting `node server.js`              
Example app listening at http://:::3000     

Is there a way to see timestamp prepended to each of these lines in console log? Eg.

18:44:21 - Running "nodemon:dev" (nodemon) task             
18:44:21 - [nodemon] v1.3.7                                 
18:44:21 - [nodemon] to restart at any time, enter `rs`     
...

I'd like to see in console when was the last server restart. Here is my gruntfile.js:

module.exports = function (grunt) {
  grunt.initConfig({
    nodemon: {
      dev: {
        script: 'server.js',
        options: {
          ext: ['js']
        }
      }
    }
  });

  grunt.loadNpmTasks('grunt-nodemon');
  grunt.registerTask('default', ['nodemon'])
};

Answer 1

Rather than try to modify the output of nodemon, a cleaner approach would be for your application to log the timestamp when it starts up.

If you use the util.log function rather than console.log , you'll get the timestamp added automatically to your log messages.