diffutils

Examples

diff -qr -x .git ports/i3lock gitprogs/i3lock

... "briefly" compares the two directories recursively, excluding sub files / directories matching '.git'

diff -x .git -rupN original modified > path_for_original.patch

... create a patch that incorporates the changes orgiginal -> modified, excluding the .git directory

cd original && patch -p1 < ../path_for_original.patch

... apply the patch from the above example

cd original && patch -p1 -R < ../path_for_original.patch

... remove the changes applied in the example above

Argument description for diff

• -B, --ignore-blank-lines ignore changes where lines are all blank
• -b, --ignore-space-change ignores changes in the amount of white space
• -N, --new-file treat absent files as empty
• -p, --show-c-function show which C function each change is in
• -q, --brief report only when files differ
• -r, --recursive recursively compare any subdirectories found
• -u, -U NUM, --unified[=NUM] output NUM (default 3) lines of unified context
• -X exclude files that match any pattern in
• -x exclude files that match
• -y, --side-by-side output in two columns
• --suppress-common-lines do not output common lines