A quick primer on why you should use these flags.
set -e causes a bash script to exit immediately when a command fails. By default the command is ignored and execution continues. Using <command> || true lets you workaround this option.
set -o pipefail sets the exit code of a pipeline to that of the rightmost command to exit with a non-zero status, or to zero if all commands of the pipeline exit successfully.
set -u treats unset variables as an error and exit immediately. This does not effect variable assignments with a default.
set -x prints each command before executing it. This is helpful for debugging. Arguments get expanded before printing.