sdiff(1)

sdiff -- print file differences side-by-side

Synopsis

sdiff [options] file1 file2

Description

sdiff uses the output of the diff command to produce a side-by-side listing of two files indicating lines that are different. Lines of the two files are printed with a blank gutter between them if the lines are identical, a ``<'' in the gutter if the line appears only in file1, a ``>'' in the gutter if the line appears only in file2, and a ``|'' for lines that are different. For example:

   	x	|	y
   	a		a
   	b	<
   	c	<
   	d		d
   		>	c

sdiff processes supplementary code set characters in files according to the locale specified in the LC_CTYPE environment variable (see LANG on environ(5)).

Valid options are:

-w n

Use the argument n as the width of the output line. The default line length is 130 columns.

-l

Print only the left side of any lines that are identical.

-s

Do not print identical lines.

-o output

Use the argument output as the name of a third file that is created as a user-controlled merge of file1 and file2. Identical lines of file1 and file2 are copied to output. Sets of differences, as produced by diff, are printed; where a set of differences share a common gutter character. After printing each set of differences, sdiff prompts the user with a ``%'' and waits for one of the following user-typed commands:

l: Append the left column to the output file.
r: Append the right column to the output file.
s: Turn on silent mode; do not print identical lines.
v: Turn off silent mode.
e l: Call the editor with the left column.
e r: Call the editor with the right column.
e b: Call the editor with the concatenation of left and right.
e: Call the editor with a zero length file.
q: Exit from the program.

On exit from the editor, the resulting file is concatenated to the end of the output file.

References

diff(1), ed(1)