1GIT-DIFF-TREE(1) Git Manual GIT-DIFF-TREE(1)
2
6 git-diff-tree - Compares the content and mode of blobs found via two
7 tree objects
8
10 git-diff-tree [--stdin] [-m] [-s] [-v] [--no-commit-id] [--pretty]
11 [-t] [-r] [-c | --cc] [--root] [<common diff options>]
12 <tree-ish> [<tree-ish>] [<path>...]
13
15 Compares the content and mode of the blobs found via two tree objects.
16 If there is only one <tree-ish> given, the commit is compared with its
18 parents (see --stdin below).
19 Note that "git-diff-tree" can use the tree encapsulated in a commit
21 object.
22
24 -p
25 Generate patch (see section on generating patches)
26 -u
28 Synonym for "-p".
29 -U<n>
31 Shorthand for "--unified=<n>".
32 --unified=<n>
34 Generate diffs with <n> lines of context instead of the usual
35 three. Implies "-p".
36 --raw
38 Generate the raw format.
39 --patch-with-raw
41 Synonym for "-p --raw".
42 --stat[=width[,name-width]]
44 Generate a diffstat. You can override the default output width for
45 80-column terminal by "--stat=width". The width of the filename
46 part can be controlled by giving another width to it separated by a
47 comma.
48 --numstat
50 Similar to --stat, but shows number of added and deleted lines in
51 decimal notation and pathname without abbreviation, to make it more
52 machine friendly. For binary files, outputs two - instead of saying
53 0 0.
54 --shortstat
56 Output only the last line of the --stat format containing total
57 number of modified files, as well as number of added and deleted
58 lines.
59 --summary
61 Output a condensed summary of extended header information such as
62 creations, renames and mode changes.
63 --patch-with-stat
65 Synonym for "-p --stat".
66 -z
68 NUL-line termination on output. This affects the --raw output field
69 terminator. Also output from commands such as "git-log" will be
70 delimited with NUL between commits.
71 --name-only
73 Show only names of changed files.
74 --name-status
76 Show only names and status of changed files.
77 --color
79 Show colored diff.
80 --no-color
82 Turn off colored diff, even when the configuration file gives the
83 default to color output.
84 --color-words
86 Show colored word diff, i.e. color words which have changed.
87 --no-renames
89 Turn off rename detection, even when the configuration file gives
90 the default to do so.
91 --check
93 Warn if changes introduce trailing whitespace or an indent that
94 uses a space before a tab.
95 --full-index
97 Instead of the first handful characters, show full object name of
98 pre- and post-image blob on the "index" line when generating a
99 patch format output.
100 --binary
102 In addition to --full-index, output "binary diff" that can be
103 applied with "git apply".
104 --abbrev[=<n>]
106 Instead of showing the full 40-byte hexadecimal object name in
107 diff-raw format output and diff-tree header lines, show only
108 handful hexdigits prefix. This is independent of --full-index
109 option above, which controls the diff-patch output format. Non
110 default number of digits can be specified with --abbrev=<n>.
111 -B
113 Break complete rewrite changes into pairs of delete and create.
114 -M
116 Detect renames.
117 -C
119 Detect copies as well as renames. See also --find-copies-harder.
120 --diff-filter=[ACDMRTUXB*]
122 Select only files that are Added (A), Copied (C), Deleted (D),
123 Modified (M), Renamed (R), have their type (mode) changed (T), are
124 Unmerged (U), are Unknown (X), or have had their pairing Broken
125 (B). Any combination of the filter characters may be used. When *
126 (All-or-none) is added to the combination, all paths are selected
127 if there is any file that matches other criteria in the comparison;
128 if there is no file that matches other criteria, nothing is
129 selected.
130 --find-copies-harder
132 For performance reasons, by default, -C option finds copies only if
133 the original file of the copy was modified in the same changeset.
134 This flag makes the command inspect unmodified files as candidates
135 for the source of copy. This is a very expensive operation for
136 large projects, so use it with caution. Giving more than one -C
137 option has the same effect.
138 -l<num>
140 -M and -C options require O(n^2) processing time where n is the
141 number of potential rename/copy targets. This option prevents
142 rename/copy detection from running if the number of rename/copy
143 targets exceeds the specified number.
144 -S<string>
146 Look for differences that contain the change in <string>.
147 --pickaxe-all
149 When -S finds a change, show all the changes in that changeset, not
150 just the files that contain the change in <string>.
151 --pickaxe-regex
153 Make the <string> not a plain string but an extended POSIX regex to
154 match.
155 -O<orderfile>
157 Output the patch in the order specified in the <orderfile>, which
158 has one shell glob pattern per line.
159 -R
161 Swap two inputs; that is, show differences from index or on-disk
162 file to tree contents.
163 --text
165 Treat all files as text.
166 -a
168 Shorthand for "--text".
169 --ignore-space-at-eol
171 Ignore changes in white spaces at EOL.
172 --ignore-space-change
174 Ignore changes in amount of white space. This ignores white space
175 at line end, and consider all other sequences of one or more white
176 space characters to be equivalent.
177 -b
179 Shorthand for "--ignore-space-change".
180 --ignore-all-space
182 Ignore white space when comparing lines. This ignores difference
183 even if one line has white space where the other line has none.
184 -w
186 Shorthand for "--ignore-all-space".
187 --exit-code
189 Make the program exit with codes similar to diff(1). That is, it
190 exits with 1 if there were differences and 0 means no differences.
191 --quiet
193 Disable all output of the program. Implies --exit-code.
194 --ext-diff
196 Allow an external diff helper to be executed. If you set an
197 external diff driver with gitlink:gitattributes(5), you need to use
198 this option with gitlink:git-log(1) and friends.
199 --no-ext-diff
201 Disallow external diff drivers.
202 For more detailed explanation on these common options, see also
203 diffcore documentation[1].
204 <tree-ish>
206 The id of a tree object.
207 <path>...
209 If provided, the results are limited to a subset of files matching
210 one of these prefix strings. i.e., file matches
211 /^<pattern1>|<pattern2>|.../ Note that this parameter does not
212 provide any wildcard or regexp features.
213 -r
215 recurse into sub-trees
216 -t
218 show tree entry itself as well as subtrees. Implies -r.
219 --root
221 When --root is specified the initial commit will be showed as a big
222 creation event. This is equivalent to a diff against the NULL tree.
223 --stdin
225 When --stdin is specified, the command does not take <tree-ish>
226 arguments from the command line. Instead, it reads either one
227 <commit> or a pair of <tree-ish> separated with a single space from
228 its standard input.
229 When a single commit is given on one line of such input, it
231 compares the commit with its parents. The following flags further
232 affects its behavior. This does not apply to the case where two
233 <tree-ish> separated with a single space are given.
234 -m
236 By default, "git-diff-tree --stdin" does not show differences for
237 merge commits. With this flag, it shows differences to that commit
238 from all of its parents. See also -c.
239 -s
241 By default, "git-diff-tree --stdin" shows differences, either in
242 machine-readable form (without -p) or in patch form (with -p). This
243 output can be suppressed. It is only useful with -v flag.
244 -v
246 This flag causes "git-diff-tree --stdin" to also show the commit
247 message before the differences.
248 --pretty[=<format>]
250 Pretty-print the contents of the commit logs in a given format,
251 where <format> can be one of oneline, short, medium, full, fuller,
252 email, raw and format:<string>. When omitted, the format defaults
253 to medium.
254 --abbrev-commit
256 Instead of showing the full 40-byte hexadecimal commit object name,
257 show only handful hexdigits prefix. Non default number of digits
258 can be specified with "--abbrev=<n>" (which also modifies diff
259 output, if it is displayed).
260 This should make "--pretty=oneline" a whole lot more readable for
262 people using 80-column terminals.
263 --encoding[=<encoding>]
265 The commit objects record the encoding used for the log message in
266 their encoding header; this option can be used to tell the command
267 to re-code the commit log message in the encoding preferred by the
268 user. For non plumbing commands this defaults to UTF-8.
269 --no-commit-id
271 git-diff-tree outputs a line with the commit ID when applicable.
272 This flag suppressed the commit ID output.
273 -c
275 This flag changes the way a merge commit is displayed (which means
276 it is useful only when the command is given one <tree-ish>, or
277 --stdin). It shows the differences from each of the parents to the
278 merge result simultaneously instead of showing pairwise diff
279 between a parent and the result one at a time (which is what the -m
280 option does). Furthermore, it lists only files which were modified
281 from all parents.
282 --cc
284 This flag changes the way a merge commit patch is displayed, in a
285 similar way to the -c option. It implies the -c and -p options and
286 further compresses the patch output by omitting hunks that show
287 differences from only one parent, or show the same change from all
288 but one parent for an Octopus merge. When this optimization makes
289 all hunks disappear, the commit itself and the commit log message
290 is not shown, just like in any other "empty diff" case.
291 --always
293 Show the commit itself and the commit log message even if the diff
294 itself is empty.
295
297 If the commit is a merge, and if the pretty-format is not oneline,
298 email or raw, an additional line is inserted before the Author: line.
299 This line begins with "Merge: " and the sha1s of ancestral commits are
300 printed, separated by spaces. Note that the listed commits may not
301 necessarily be the list of the direct parent commits if you have
302 limited your view of history: for example, if you are only interested
303 in changes related to a certain directory or file.
304 Here are some additional details for each format:
306 · oneline
309 <sha1> <title line>
312 This is designed to be as compact as possible.
313 · short
315 commit <sha1>
318 Author: <author>
319 <title line>
321 · medium
323 commit <sha1>
326 Author: <author>
327 Date: <date>
328 <title line>
330 <full commit message>
332 · full
334 commit <sha1>
337 Author: <author>
338 Commit: <committer>
339 <title line>
341 <full commit message>
343 · fuller
345 commit <sha1>
348 Author: <author>
349 AuthorDate: <date & time>
350 Commit: <committer>
351 CommitDate: <date & time>
352 <title line>
354 <full commit message>
356 · email
358 From <sha1> <date>
361 From: <author>
362 Date: <date & time>
363 Subject: [PATCH] <title line>
364 <full commit message>
366 · raw
368 The raw format shows the entire commit exactly as stored in the
370 commit object. Notably, the SHA1s are displayed in full, regardless
371 of whether --abbrev or --no-abbrev are used, and parents
372 information show the true parent commits, without taking grafts nor
373 history simplification into account.
374 · format:
376 The format: format allows you to specify which information you want
378 to show. It works a little bit like printf format, with the notable
379 exception that you get a newline with %n instead of \n.
380 E.g, format:"The author of %h was %an, %ar%nThe title was >>%s<<%n"
382 would show something like this:
383 The author of fe6e0ee was Junio C Hamano, 23 hours ago
387 The title was >>t4119: test autocomputing -p<n> for traditional diff input.<<
388 The placeholders are:
391 · %H: commit hash
394 · %h: abbreviated commit hash
396 · %T: tree hash
398 · %t: abbreviated tree hash
400 · %P: parent hashes
402 · %p: abbreviated parent hashes
404 · %an: author name
406 · %ae: author email
408 · %ad: author date
410 · %aD: author date, RFC2822 style
412 · %ar: author date, relative
414 · %at: author date, UNIX timestamp
416 · %ai: author date, ISO 8601 format
418 · %cn: committer name
420 · %ce: committer email
422 · %cd: committer date
424 · %cD: committer date, RFC2822 style
426 · %cr: committer date, relative
428 · %ct: committer date, UNIX timestamp
430 · %ci: committer date, ISO 8601 format
432 · %e: encoding
434 · %s: subject
436 · %b: body
438 · %Cred: switch color to red
440 · %Cgreen: switch color to green
442 · %Cblue: switch color to blue
444 · %Creset: reset color
446 · %m: left, right or boundary mark
448 · %n: newline
450
452 If you´re only interested in differences in a subset of files, for
453 example some architecture-specific files, you might do:
454 git-diff-tree -r <tree-ish> <tree-ish> arch/ia64 include/asm-ia64
457 and it will only show you what changed in those two directories.
458 Or if you are searching for what changed in just kernel/sched.c, just
460 do
461 git-diff-tree -r <tree-ish> <tree-ish> kernel/sched.c
464 and it will ignore all differences to other files.
465 The pattern is always the prefix, and is matched exactly. There are no
467 wildcards. Even stricter, it has to match a complete path component.
468 I.e. "foo" does not pick up foobar.h. "foo" does match foo/bar.h so it
469 can be used to name subdirectories.
470 An example of normal usage is:
472 torvalds@ppc970:~/git> git-diff-tree 5319e4......
475 *100664->100664 blob ac348b.......->a01513....... git-fsck-objects.c
476 which tells you that the last commit changed just one file (it´s from
477 this one:
478 commit 3c6f7ca19ad4043e9e72fa94106f352897e651a8
482 tree 5319e4d609cdd282069cc4dce33c1db559539b03
483 parent b4e628ea30d5ab3606119d2ea5caeab141d38df7
484 author Linus Torvalds <torvalds@ppc970.osdl.org> Sat Apr 9 12:02:30 2005
485 committer Linus Torvalds <torvalds@ppc970.osdl.org> Sat Apr 9 12:02:30 2005
486 Make "git-fsck-objects" print out all the root commits it finds.
488 Once I do the reference tracking, I´ll also make it print out all the
490 HEAD commits it finds, which is even more interesting.
491 in case you care).
493
495 The output format from "git-diff-index", "git-diff-tree" and
496 "git-diff-files" are very similar.
497 These commands all compare two sets of things; what is compared
499 differs:
500 git-diff-index <tree-ish>
502 compares the <tree-ish> and the files on the filesystem.
503 git-diff-index --cached <tree-ish>
505 compares the <tree-ish> and the index.
506 git-diff-tree [-r] <tree-ish-1> <tree-ish-2> [<pattern>...]
508 compares the trees named by the two arguments.
509 git-diff-files [<pattern>...]
511 compares the index and the files on the filesystem.
512 An output line is formatted this way:
513 in-place edit :100644 100644 bcd1234... 0123456... M file0
517 copy-edit :100644 100644 abcd123... 1234567... C68 file1 file2
518 rename-edit :100644 100644 abcd123... 1234567... R86 file1 file3
519 create :000000 100644 0000000... 1234567... A file4
520 delete :100644 000000 1234567... 0000000... D file5
521 unmerged :000000 000000 0000000... 0000000... U file6
522 That is, from the left to the right:
524 1. a colon.
527 2. mode for "src"; 000000 if creation or unmerged.
529 3. a space.
531 4. mode for "dst"; 000000 if deletion or unmerged.
533 5. a space.
535 6. sha1 for "src"; 0{40} if creation or unmerged.
537 7. a space.
539 8. sha1 for "dst"; 0{40} if creation, unmerged or "look at work
541 tree".
542 9. a space.
544 10. status, followed by optional "score" number.
546 11. a tab or a NUL when -z option is used.
548 12. path for "src"
550 13. a tab or a NUL when -z option is used; only exists for C or R.
552 14. path for "dst"; only exists for C or R.
554 15. an LF or a NUL when -z option is used, to terminate the record.
556 <sha1> is shown as all 0´s if a file is new on the filesystem and it is
557 out of sync with the index.
558 Example:
560 :100644 100644 5be4a4...... 000000...... M file.c
564 When -z option is not used, TAB, LF, and backslash characters in
566 pathnames are represented as \t, \n, and \\, respectively.
567
569 "git-diff-tree" and "git-diff-files" can take -c or --cc option to
570 generate diff output also for merge commits. The output differs from
571 the format described above in the following way:
572 1. there is a colon for each parent
575 2. there are more "src" modes and "src" sha1
577 3. status is concatenated status characters for each parent
579 4. no optional "score" number
581 5. single path, only for "dst"
583 Example:
584 ::100644 100644 100644 fabadb8... cc95eb0... 4866510... MM describe.c
588 Note that combined diff lists only files which were modified from all
590 parents.
591
593 When "git-diff-index", "git-diff-tree", or "git-diff-files" are run
594 with a -p option, they do not produce the output described above;
595 instead they produce a patch file. You can customize the creation of
596 such patches via the GIT_EXTERNAL_DIFF and the GIT_DIFF_OPTS
597 environment variables.
598 What the -p option produces is slightly different from the traditional
600 diff format.
601 1. It is preceded with a "git diff" header, that looks like this:
604 diff --git a/file1 b/file2
607 The a/ and b/ filenames are the same unless rename/copy is
608 involved. Especially, even for a creation or a deletion, /dev/null
609 is not used in place of a/ or b/ filenames.
610 When rename/copy is involved, file1 and file2 show the name of the
612 source file of the rename/copy and the name of the file that
613 rename/copy produces, respectively.
614 2. It is followed by one or more extended header lines:
616 old mode <mode>
619 new mode <mode>
620 deleted file mode <mode>
621 new file mode <mode>
622 copy from <path>
623 copy to <path>
624 rename from <path>
625 rename to <path>
626 similarity index <number>
627 dissimilarity index <number>
628 index <hash>..<hash> <mode>
629 3. TAB, LF, double quote and backslash characters in pathnames are
631 represented as \t, \n, \" and \\, respectively. If there is need
632 for such substitution then the whole pathname is put in double
633 quotes.
634 The similarity index is the percentage of unchanged lines, and the
635 dissimilarity index is the percentage of changed lines. It is a rounded
636 down integer, followed by a percent sign. The similarity index value of
637 100% is thus reserved for two equal files, while 100% dissimilarity
638 means that no line from the old file made it into the new one.
639
641 git-diff-tree and git-diff-files can take -c or --cc option to produce
642 combined diff, which looks like this:
643 diff --combined describe.c
647 index fabadb8,cc95eb0..4866510
648 --- a/describe.c
649 +++ b/describe.c
650 @@@ -98,20 -98,12 +98,20 @@@
651 return (a_date > b_date) ? -1 : (a_date == b_date) ? 0 : 1;
652 }
653 - static void describe(char *arg)
655 -static void describe(struct commit *cmit, int last_one)
656 ++static void describe(char *arg, int last_one)
657 {
658 + unsigned char sha1[20];
659 + struct commit *cmit;
660 struct commit_list *list;
661 static int initialized = 0;
662 struct commit_name *n;
663 + if (get_sha1(arg, sha1) < 0)
665 + usage(describe_usage);
666 + cmit = lookup_commit_reference(sha1);
667 + if (!cmit)
668 + usage(describe_usage);
669 +
670 if (!initialized) {
671 initialized = 1;
672 for_each_ref(get_name);
673 1. It is preceded with a "git diff" header, that looks like this
676 (when -c option is used):
677 diff --combined file
680 or like this (when --cc option is used):
681 diff --c file
684 2. It is followed by one or more extended header lines (this example
686 shows a merge with two parents):
687 index <hash>,<hash>..<hash>
690 mode <mode>,<mode>..<mode>
691 new file mode <mode>
692 deleted file mode <mode>,<mode>
693 The mode <mode>,<mode>..<mode> line appears only if at least one of
694 the <mode> is different from the rest. Extended headers with
695 information about detected contents movement (renames and copying
696 detection) are designed to work with diff of two <tree-ish> and are
697 not used by combined diff format.
698 3. It is followed by two-line from-file/to-file header
700 --- a/file
703 +++ b/file
704 Similar to two-line header for traditional unified diff format,
705 /dev/null is used to signal created or deleted files.
706 4. Chunk header format is modified to prevent people from
708 accidentally feeding it to patch -p1. Combined diff format was
709 created for review of merge commit changes, and was not meant for
710 apply. The change is similar to the change in the extended index
711 header:
712 @@@ <from-file-range> <from-file-range> <to-file-range> @@@
715 There are (number of parents + 1) @ characters in the chunk header
716 for combined diff format.
717 Unlike the traditional unified diff format, which shows two files A and
718 B with a single column that has - (minus — appears in A but removed in
719 B), + (plus — missing in A but added to B), or " " (space — unchanged)
720 prefix, this format compares two or more files file1, file2,... with
721 one file X, and shows how X differs from each of fileN. One column for
722 each of fileN is prepended to the output line to note how X´s line is
723 different from it.
724 A - character in the column N means that the line appears in fileN but
726 it does not appear in the result. A + character in the column N means
727 that the line appears in the last file, and fileN does not have that
728 line (in other words, the line was added, from the point of view of
729 that parent).
730 In the above example output, the function signature was changed from
732 both files (hence two - removals from both file1 and file2, plus + to
733 mean one line that was added does not appear in either file1 nor
734 file2). Also two other lines are the same from file1 but do not appear
735 in file2 (hence prefixed with ).
736 When shown by git diff-tree -c, it compares the parents of a merge
738 commit with the merge result (i.e. file1..fileN are the parents). When
739 shown by git diff-files -c, it compares the two unresolved merge
740 parents with the working tree file (i.e. file1 is stage 2 aka "our
741 version", file2 is stage 3 aka "their version").
742
744 Written by Linus Torvalds <torvalds@osdl.org>
745
747 Documentation by David Greaves, Junio C Hamano and the git-list
748 <git@vger.kernel.org>.
749
751 Part of the git(7) suite
752
754 1. diffcore documentation
755 diffcore.html
756Git 1.5.3.3 10/09/2007 GIT-DIFF-TREE(1)