Ignore newlines with diff

Question

I'd like to ignore newlines when I compare c source files. For example I want following two codes are reported they are same.

// codeA
int main(int argc, char *argv[]) 
{

// codeB
int main(int argc, char *argv[]) {

I already have tried following options but could not get the result.

diff -b codeA codeB
diff -w codeA codeB

Yes, "-B" also reports they are different. – user1292251 Nov 02 '12 at 09:55 — user1292251, Nov 02 '12 at 09:55

score 7 · Answer 1 · answered Nov 03 '12 at 11:39

7

There is a tool called "word diff" (tool command line must be 'wdiff') which might help. http://www.gnu.org/software/wdiff/manual/wdiff.html

answered Nov 03 '12 at 11:39

armel

Is there a good tool for visualizing the output of wdiff? In particular, it would be nice if they color-coded the differences – nukeguy Jul 19 '17 at 20:07
there is another option which is to use: git diff --color-words if applicable – armel Jul 19 '17 at 21:14
@nukeguy it's ironic that you put that comment right under the link to the manual which includes a colored output example http://www.gnu.org/software/wdiff/manual/wdiff.html#wdiff-Examples – Jeff Oct 02 '17 at 22:45

score 4 · Accepted Answer · answered Nov 02 '12 at 09:56

4

You can pretty print both files using, for example, GNU Indent, http://www.gnu.org/software/indent/ , and then compare them with diff.

answered Nov 02 '12 at 09:56

piokuc

score 0 · Answer 3 · answered Sep 08 '19 at 15:33

0

If you want an all or nothing answer you can first strip the files of newlines:

cat file.txt | tr -d '\n' > stripped.txt

This is of course very unhelpful for finding actual differences.

answered Sep 08 '19 at 15:33

Victor Eijkhout

3 Answers3