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In computing, the utility diff is a data comparison tool that computes and displays the differences between the contents of files. Unlike edit distance notions used for other purposes, diff is line-oriented rather than character-oriented, but it is like Levenshtein distance in that it tries to determine the smallest set of deletions and insertions to create one file from the other.
The difference is an exact number of quarters of an hour up to 95 (same minutes modulo 15 and seconds) if the file was transported across zones; there is also a one-hour difference within a single zone caused by the transition between standard time and daylight saving time (DST). Some, but not all, file comparison and synchronisation software ...
On most modern Unix-like systems, even BSD-derived ones like FreeBSD and NetBSD, the diff3 provided is GNU's version in diffutils (formerly GNU Tools). This version has the ability to merge files on its own without relying on ed. It internally invokes diff to do the comparison, but can use any other compatible tool too. [3]
Displaying the differences between two or more sets of data, file comparison tools can make computing simpler, and more efficient by focusing on new data and ignoring what did not change. Generically known as a diff [1] after the Unix diff utility, there are a range of ways to compare data sources and display the results.
Unlike other operating systems, Linux and Unix allow any file system regardless of the medium it is stored on, whether that medium is a magnetic disk, an optical disk (CD, DVD, etc.), a USB flash memory key, or even contained within a file located on another file system.
Meld is a visual diff and merge tool, targeted at developers. It allows users to compare two or three files or directories visually, color-coding the different lines. Meld can be used for comparing files, directories, and version controlled repositories.
The computer tool patch is a Unix program that updates text files according to instructions contained in a separate file, called a patch file.The patch file (also called a patch for short) is a text file that consists of a list of differences and is produced by running the related diff program with the original and updated file as arguments.
The primary distinction between comm and diff is that comm discards information about the order of the lines prior to sorting. A minor difference between comm and diff is that comm will not try to indicate that a line has "changed" between the two files; lines are either shown in the "from file #1", "from file #2", or "in both" columns. This ...