diff command

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1

Hi,

I have 2 files i would like to have a DIFF command:

1.Marks differences between files
or
2.Mentions just the differences

Thanks
:slight_smile:

2

.....

3

If dir1 is a directory
containing a directory named x,
and dir2 is a directory
containing a directory named x,
dir1/x and dir2/x both contain files named date.out,
and
dir2/x contains a file named y,

the command:
example% diff -r dir1 dir2
could produce output similar to:

  Common subdirectories: dir1/x and dir2/x
  Only in dir2/x: y
  diff -r dir1/x/date.out dir2/x/date.out
  1c1

Dont know if this helps more info in the man diff

4

Another useful command is 'sdiff'. It displays the full contents of the files side by side, noting differences.

Cheers,

Keith

5

Personally for more complicated diffs I prefer using a GUI program like kdiff3 with color-coding of different changed chunks, and you can use such kind of tools to merge conflicts very easily (and interactively).

P.S. Just for your information, I asked a related question on related diff command-line tools a couple of months earlier (though I eventually settled with GUI which I found from some obscure sources, and that seems to fit my needs really well):

6

Hello All,

I thank you for your help but still i didn't succeed in comparing two files and recieving a new file which contains just the diffrences between the two.

I need it badly with my everyday work.

:slight_smile: thanks,
Irit

7

First produce a diff of two files, say file1 is the old copy, file2 is the newer copy.

diff file1 file2 > delta.diff

Then you can apply the diff to file1 by using the patch command:

patch -p0 < delta.diff file1

8

Try also

man comm