Add flag to disable terminal clear in --watch mode

[silverwind]

What is the problem this feature will solve?

Currently --watch clears the terminal every time it restarts the process. This can hide vital information that the process logs on shutdown or from other processes running in the same terminal.

What is the feature you are proposing to solve the problem?

Remove the terminal clearing because it is opinionated. If this is not desired, make it opt-out via a flag like TypeScript's preserveWatchOutput or the nodemon solution.

What alternatives have you considered?

nodemon also does not clear terminal on restart, so it is an alternative.

[MoLow]

sounds like a flag/config that can be added 👍🏻

[silverwind]

Thanks, updated issue title and I also investigated nodemon, they default to not clearing but there are various supported ways to achieve clearing. I think it should be definitely made configurable because user preferences vary.

[debadree25]

hello, how taking a stab at the issue, how do I whitelist a command/flag
I am getting this error message out/Release/node: bad option: --dont-clear-on-restart any pointers would be very much appreciated

Thank you!
cc @MoLow

[debadree25]

Ok was able to figure out have started a draft PR, attempting to add tests

[tniessen]

Quoting myself from #45717:

Is clearing the terminal really a good default choice? Doesn't that potentially take away error messages etc., depending on the terminal host? What if stdout is not a TTY?