Unix file comparison

[sabate]

I'm doing a code review that compares one directory to another. I keep getting differences and when I go in to Clearcase vtree and do a compare betweew the two it shows the entire file as being differnt. We first thought it was a spacing issue so ran a (dircmp -w firstfile secondfile ) we got a whole screen of information. Nothing that is helping. I went through line for line and can't find a difference. This is why I think it's a spacing issue all the words are coming up different....yet they are are all the same...I'm about to blow over this.....

 

[PHV]

Have you tried cmp to see at which character the difference starts ?
You may also consider to compare with diff the hexadimal dumps (man od).

Hope This Help, PH.
Want to get great answers to your Tek-Tips questions? Have a look at FAQ219-2884 or FAQ222-2244

 

[sabate]

Thanks, I've tried both and keep getting the entire file line by line... I'm now copying the two files into word and doing a word count....looks like the counts are off so I guess I'm going to conquer this the old fashion way....line by line with a highlighter...unless you know of something I'm doing wrong. I have 35 files I will have to go through : (

I did...
diff -w par_cc/ddl/P_trls_b.sql par_up403/ddl/P_trls_b.sql

THEN THIS...

comm -12 par_cc/ddl/P_trls_b.sql par_up403/ddl/P_trls_b.sql
THEN THIS...

sdiff -o output par_cc/ddl/P_trls_b.sql par_up403/ddl/P_trls_b.sql

AND EVEN THIS...

sdiff -s par_cc/ddl/P_trls_b.sql par_up403/ddl/P_trls_b.sql

Nothing seems to work......

 

[PHV]

Have you checked the file size ?
What is the output of the cmp command ?

Hope This Help, PH.
Want to get great answers to your Tek-Tips questions? Have a look at FAQ219-2884 or FAQ222-2244

 

[mrmac228]

What about using vi to edit the file then use the command ":set list"

This will show control characters in the files (normally the problem is spaces being replaced by tabs or visa-versa)

Have two terminal windows side by side for the files.

hth

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[ericbrunson]

diff -w will ignore whitespace in the file.

 

[sabate]

Thanks everyone for your great advise unfortunately it wasn't the spaces or tabs it seems to be the date/time stamp they are different ...so if anyone know how I can perform a diffcmp and get it to ignore the time stamp, that would be great

 

[stefanwagner]

I can't.
But if you want to count words next time, use wc.

>wc file
c w l

c:characters
w:words
l:lines

... copy into word... ts, ts, ts, ...

On linux/kde you might use kdiff, which is much better viewable than diff.

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