dwdiff(1)						    delimited word diff program 						 dwdiff(1)

NAME

       dwdiff - a delimited word diff program

SYNOPSIS

       dwdiff [OPTIONS] <OLD FILE> <NEW FILE>
       dwdiff [OPTIONS] --diff-input [<DIFF FILE>]

DESCRIPTION

       dwdiff  is  a diff program that operates at the word level instead of the line level. It is different from wdiff in that it allows the user
       to specify what should be considered whitespace, and in that it takes an optional list of characters that should be considered  delimiters.
       Delimiters  are	single	characters  that are treated as if they are words, even when there is no whitespace separating them from preceding
       words or delimiters. dwdiff is mostly command-line compatible with wdiff.  Only the --autopager, --terminal and --avoid-wraps  options  are
       not supported.

       The default output from dwdiff is the new text, with the deleted and inserted parts annotated with markers. Command line options are avail-
       able to change both what is printed, and the markers.

OPTIONS

       dwdiff accepts the following options (Note that all strings will first be escape expanded. All standard -escapes are supported, as well as
       u and U Unicode escapes):

       -h, --help
	      Display a short help message.

       -v, --version
	      Print version and copyright information.

       -d <delimiters>, --delimiters=<delimiters>
	      Specify a list of characters to be used as delimiters.

       -P, --punctuation>
	      Use punctuation characters as delimiters. The exact set of punctuation characters depends on the current locale.

       -W <whitespace>, --whitespace=<whitespace>
	      Specify a list of characters to be used as whitespace.

       --diff-input
	      Interpret  the  input  as the output from diff in the Unified Diff format (usually produced by diff -u). In this case only one input
	      file is allowed. This option allows reformating diff output with dwdiff, and is useful for example to post-process the output of svn
	      diff.

       -1, --no-deleted
	      Suppress printing of words deleted from the first file.

       -2, --no-inserted
	      Suppress printing of words inserted in the second file.

       -3, --no-common
	      Suppress printing of words common to both files.

       -L[<width>], --line-numbers[=<width>]
	      Show  line  numbers at the start of each line. The line numbers displayed are the line number in the old file and the line number in
	      the new file respectively. The optional <width> argument is the minimum number of positions per line number.

       -C<num>, --context=<num>
	      Show <num> lines of context before and after each changes. A line with only -- is printed between blocks of changes.

       -s, --statistics
	      Print statistics when done. The numbers printed include the number of words from in both files, the number  of  deleted  words,  the
	      number  of  inserted  words, and the number of changed words. The number of changed words is counted as the number of words that are
	      removed from the first file, and the number of words that replace them from the second file. All of these numbers are also expressed
	      as a percentage of the total number of words in the file the words came from.

       -i, --ignore-case
	      Ignore differences in case when comparing words. This option is only available if the diff program that is called provides it.

       -I, --ignore-formatting
	      Ignore differences in formatting of characters. This option switches to using the Unicode compatibility decomposition instead of the
	      canonical decomposition.	The compatibility decomposition discards formatting information. For example,  the  ligature  fi  will	be
	      decomposed into two separate characters for the purposes of comparison. However, also super- and subscript will be regarded equal as
	      well as different rotations of the same character.

       -c[<spec>], --color[=<spec>]
	      Color mode. The optional <spec> can be used to customize the colors.  <spec> consists of [<delete>],[<insert>]. If either is  omited
	      it  will	be  set  to  its  default  color  (bright  red	or bright green respectively). Both parts of the <spec> consist of [<fore-
	      ground>][:<background>]. To obtain a list of permissible color names, use the word ``list'' as <spec>. Alternatively, you can  spec-
	      ify any escape sequence to set attributes as a color by prepending e:.

	      The  standard  markers  for  the begin and end of deleted and inserted text are suppressed, but any markers specified on the command
	      line will still be printed.

       -l, --less-mode
	      As -p but also overstrike deleted whitespace.

       -p, --printer
	      Use overstriking with an underscore and bold text to emphasize changes. This is implemented by first printing the  underscore  or  a
	      duplicate  of  the  character to be printed, followed by a backspace, followed by the character.	On regular terminals you won't see
	      any effect. The less(1) command will however show underlined and bold text.

	      The standard markers for the begin and end of deleted and inserted text are suppressed, but any markers  specified  on  the  command
	      line will still be printed.

       -m<num>, --match-context=<num>
	      Use  <num> words of context before and after words for matching. Words in the old text will then only match words in the new text if
	      words surrounding them are also equal. This improves the output for dwdiff for large changes with frequently  occuring  words.  How-
	      ever, using context requires more disk space and more processing time. The default value is 1. Set this option to 0 to revert to the
	      pre 1.5 behavior.

       --aggregate-changes
	      Allow multiple close changes to be treated as one change, if context words are used (see --match-context). This option  reduces  the
	      processing time as the changes reported by the diff program are not post-processed to give more precise results.

       -A <algorithm>, --algorithm=<algorithm>
	      Select  the  algorithm  to  be used for determining differences. There are three possible values for algorithm: best, which tries to
	      find the minimal set of changes, normal, which trades some optimality for speed, and fast, which assumes that the input is large and
	      contains few changes.  By default the normal algorithm is used.

       -S[<marker>], --paragraph-separator[=<marker>]
	      Show  insertion  or  deletion  of  blocks of lines with only whitespace characters.  A special marker is inserted into the output to
	      indicate these blocks. The default marker is <-->.

       --wdiff-output
	      Create wdiff compatible output. The dwdiff program uses a different output algorithm, which provides a more intuitive output.

       -w <string>, --start-delete=<string>
	      Specify a string to mark begin of deleted text.

       -x <string>, --stop-delete=<string>
	      Specify a string to mark end of deleted text.

       -y <string>, --start-insert=<string>
	      Specify a string to mark begin of inserted text.

       -z <string>, --stop-insert=<string>
	      Specify a string to mark end of inserted text.

       -R, --repeat-markers
	      Repeat the begin and end markers at the start and end of line if a change crosses a newline.

       A single dash (-) as a file can be used to denote standard input. Only one file can be read from standard input. To stop dwdiff from inter-
       preting	file  names  that start with a dash as options, one can specify a double dash (--) after which dwdiff will interpret any following
       arguments as files to read.

BUGS

       If you think you have found a bug, please check that you are using the latest version of  dwdiff  [http://os.ghalkes.nl/dwdiff.html].  When
       reporting bugs, please include a minimal example that demonstrates the problem.

AUTHOR

       G.P. Halkes <dwdiff@ghalkes.nl>

COPYRIGHT

       Copyright (C) 2006-2011 G.P. Halkes and others
       dwdiff is licensed under the GNU General Public License version 3.
       For   more   details   on  the  license,  see  the  file  COPYING  in  the  documentation  directory.  On  Un*x	systems  this  is  usually
       /usr/share/doc/dwdiff-2.0.4.

SEE ALSO

       dwfilter(1), wdiff(1), diff(1)

Version 2.0.4							    12-06-2012								 dwdiff(1)