NAME

       podiff - compare textual information in two PO files

SYNOPSIS

       podiff [OPTIONS] FILE1 FILE2
       podiff [OPTIONS] PATH OLD-FILE OLD-HEX OLD-MODE NEW-FILE NEW-HEX NEW-MODE
       podiff -t [OPTIONS] FILE
       podiff [-vh]

DESCRIPTION

       The  podiff utility finds differences in translatable strings and translations between two
       PO files or between two revisions of the same file.   It  uses  diff(1)  to  generate  the
       output.   Before comparing, it eliminates all comments and multiple empty lines, sorts the
       two files by their msgid and reformats all textual  strings  in  a  uniform  manner.   The
       utility  is  intended to help translators obtain meaningful information about changes they
       do to PO files.

       When supplied two non-optional arguments podiff acts as a standalone program  and  outputs
       differences  between  the  two PO files.  Its exit code is 1 if the two files differ and 0
       otherwise.

       When given 7 arguments (second case above), podiff compares OLD-FILE and  NEW-FILE.   This
       mode  is  intended  for  use  as  a git(1) external diff utility (see GIT_EXTERNAL_DIFF in
       git(1) and Generating diff text in gitattributes(5)).  In  this  mode  its  exit  code  is
       always 0, except if some errors occur.  See the EXAMPLE section below.

       The podiff utility understand the following command line options:

       -d CMD Use CMD as a diff utility.

       -D OPTION
              Pass OPTION as an option to the diff utility.

       -f     Ignore fuzzy translations.

       -k     Keep user comments on output.

       -L     External diff understands the -L option.  If this option is given, podiff will pass
              two additional options to diff: -La/FILE -Lb/FILE, where FILE is  the  pathname  of
              the file being diff'ed.

       -w NUM Limit output width to NUM columns (see BUGS below, though).

       -t     Test  mode.  In this mode, podiff takes a single file name as its argument and acts
              as a preprocessor for this file, producing its normalized version on  the  standard
              output.  This mode is intended for debugging.

       -h     Prints a terse usage summary.

       -v     Prints program version and licence information.

RETURN VALUE

       In standalone mode (2 arguments), the return code is 0 if the two files don't differ and 1
       otherwise.

       In Git mode, the return code is 0 unless errors occur.

       The return code is 2 if an invalid command line option or invalid number of  arguments  is
       given.

EXAMPLE

       The  following example shows how to use podiff as an external diff utility in git(1).  The
       system diff utility will be passed the -u and two -L options.

       First, add the following section to the .git/config file:

       [diff "podiff"]
               command = /usr/bin/podiff -D-u -L

       Next, to the .gitattributes file in the directory with your PO files,  add  the  following
       line:

       *.po    diff=podiff

SEE ALSO

       diff(1), git(1), gitattributes(5).

BUGS

       The  -w  option  actually operates on bytes, not characters, therefore actual output width
       can be less than its argument.

AUTHORS

       Sergey Poznyakoff

BUG REPORTS

       Report bugs to <gray@gnu.org.ua>.

COPYRIGHT

       Copyright © 2011--2020 Sergey Poznyakoff
       License GPLv3+: GNU GPL version 3 or later <http://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>
       This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it.  There is NO  WARRANTY,
       to the extent permitted by law.