jshint: I can't set linting options

The eqeqeq option is an “enforcing option,” meaning that it should only produce warnings when set to true. You have identified an inconsistency in JSHint’s enforcement of this particular linting rule.

The option’s description states, “This options prohibits the use of == and != in favor of === and !==.” Enabling it will cause JSHint to issue warning W118 for offending code. However, JSHint will issue a separate warning (W041) if either side of the comparison is a “falsey” literal value, regardless of the value of the eqeqeq option.

The long-term resolution for the project, removing W041 altogether. It’s a shame because it makes JSHint less strict by default, but the current behavior is inconsistent and confusing. And while the warning message for W041 is far more descriptive (and therefore a better choice to keep around), we can’t change W118 in-place outside of a major version release. This should be relatively straightforward, so I’ve marked this issue as a “good first bug.”

The short-term resolution for users is to disable W041 in your project configuration, either with an in-line directive:

// jshint -W041

Or within a JSHint configuration file:

{
  "-W041": true
}