Ubuntu Manpage: filterdiff - extract or exclude diffs from a diff file

NAME

       filterdiff - extract or exclude diffs from a diff file

SYNOPSIS

       filterdiff [[-i PATTERN] | [--include=PATTERN]] [[-I FILE] | [--include-from-file=FILE]]
                  [[-p n] | [--strip-match=n]] [--strip=n] [--addprefix=PREFIX]
                  [--addoldprefix=PREFIX] [--addnewprefix=PREFIX] [[-x PATTERN] |
                  [--exclude=PATTERN]] [[-X FILE] | [--exclude-from-file=FILE]] [[-v] |
                  [--verbose]] [--clean] [[-z] | [--decompress]] [[-# RANGE] | [--hunks=RANGE]]
                  [--lines=RANGE] [[-FRANGE] | [--files=RANGE]] [--annotate] [--format=FORMAT]
                  [--as-numbered-lines=WHEN] [--remove-timestamps] [file...]

       filterdiff {[--help] | [--version] | [--list] | [--grep ...]}

DESCRIPTION

       You can use filterdiff to obtain a patch that applies to files matching the shell wildcard
       PATTERN from a larger collection of patches. For example, to see the patches in
       patch-2.4.3.gz that apply to all files called lp.c:

           filterdiff -z -i '*/lp.c' patch-2.4.3.gz

       If neither -i nor -x options are given, -i '*' is assumed. This way filterdiff can be used
       to clean up an existing diff file, removing redundant lines from the beginning (eg. the
       text from the mail body) or between the chunks (eg. in CVS diffs). To extract pure patch
       data, use a command like this:

           filterdiff message-with-diff-in-the-body > patch

       Note that the interpretation of the shell wildcard pattern does not count slash characters
       or periods as special (in other words, no flags are given to fnmatch). This is so that
       “*/basename”-type patterns can be given without limiting the number of pathname
       components.

       You can use both unified and context format diffs with this program.

OPTIONS

-i PATTERN, --include=PATTERN
Include only files matching PATTERN. All other lines in the input are suppressed.

-I FILE, --include-from-file=FILE
Include only files matching any pattern listed in FILE, one pattern per line. All
other lines in the input are suppressed.

-x PATTERN, --exclude=PATTERN
Exclude files matching PATTERN. All other lines in the input are displayed.

-X FILE, --exclude-from-file=FILE
Exclude files matching any pattern listed in FILE, one pattern per line. All other
lines in the input are displayed.

-p n, --strip-match=n
When matching, ignore the first n components of the pathname.

-# RANGE, --hunks=RANGE
Only include hunks within the specified RANGE. Hunks are numbered from 1, and the
range is a comma-separated list of numbers or “first-last” spans, optionially
preceeded by a modifier 'x' which inverts the entire range; either the first or the
last in the span may be omitted to indicate no limit in that direction.

--lines=RANGE
Only include hunks that contain lines from the original file that lie within the
specified RANGE. Lines are numbered from 1, and the range is a comma-separated list of
numbers or “first-last” spans, optionially preceeded by a modifier 'x' which inverts
the entire range; either the first or the last in the span may be omitted to indicate
no limit in that direction.

-F=RANGE, --files=RANGE
Only include files indicated by the specified RANGE. Files are numbered from 1 in the
order they appear in the patch input, and the range is a comma-separated list of
numbers or “first-last” spans, optionially preceeded by a modifier 'x' which inverts
the entire range; either the first or the last in the span may be omitted to indicate
no limit in that direction.

--annotate
Annotate each hunk with the filename and hunk number.

--format=unified|context
Use specified output format.

--strip=n
Remove the first n components of pathnames in the output.

--addprefix=PREFIX
Prefix pathnames in the output by PREFIX. This will override any individual settings
specified with the --addoldprefix or --addnewprefix options.

--addoldprefix=PREFIX
Prefix pathnames for old or original files in the output by PREFIX.

--addnewprefix=PREFIX
Prefix pathnames for updated or new files in the output by PREFIX.

--as-numbered-lines=before|after
Instead of a patch fragment, display the lines of the selected hunks with the line
number of the file before (or after) the patch is applied, followed by a TAB character
and a colon, at the beginning of each line. Each hunk except the first will have a
line consisting of “...” before it.

--remove-timestamps
Do not include file timestamps in the output.

-v, --verbose
Always show non-diff lines in the output. By default, non-diff lines are only shown
when excluding a filename pattern.

--clean
Always remove all non-diff lines from the output. Even when excluding a filename
pattern.

-z, --decompress
Decompress files with extensions .gz and .bz2.

--help
Display a short usage message.

--version
Display the version number of filterdiff.

--list
Behave like lsdiff(1) instead.

--grep
Behave like grepdiff(1) instead.

EXAMPLES

       To see all patch hunks that affect the first five lines of a C file:

           filterdiff -i '*.c' --lines=-5 < patch

       To see the first hunk of each file patch, use:

           filterdiff -#1 patchfile

       To see patches modifying a ChangeLog file in a subdirectory, use:

           filterdiff -p1 Changelog

       To see the complete patches for each patch that modifies line 1 of the original file, use:

           filterdiff --lines=1 patchfile | lsdiff | \
             xargs -rn1 filterdiff patchfile -i

       To see all but the first hunk of a particular patch, you might use:

           filterdiff -p1 -i file.c -#2- foo-patch

       If you have a very specific list of hunks in a patch that you want to see, list them:


           filterdiff -#1,2,5-8,10,12,27-
       To see the lines of the files that would be patched as they will appear after the patch is
       applied, use:

           filterdiff --as-numbered-lines=after patch.file

       You can see the same context before the patch is applied with:

           filterdiff --as-numbered-lines=before
           patch.file

       Filterdiff can also be used to convert between unified and context format diffs:

           filterdiff -v --format=unified context.diff

AUTHOR