NAME

diff3 − 3-way differential file comparison

SYNOPSIS

diff3 [ −x3 ] file1 file2 file3

DESCRIPTION

Diff3 compares three versions of a file, and publishes disagreeing ranges of text flagged with these codes:

==== all three files differ

====1 file1 is different

====2 file2 is different

====3 file3 is different

The type of change that occurs in converting a given range of a given file to some other is indicated in one of the following ways:

f : n1 a Text is to be appended after line number n1 in file f, where f = 1, 2, or 3. 

f : n1 , n2 c Text is to be changed in the range line n1 to line n2. If n1 = n2, the range may be abbreviated to n1.

The original contents of the range follow immediately after a c indication.  When the contents of two files are identical, the contents of the lower-numbered file are suppressed. 

Option −x (−3) produces a script to only incorporate changes flagged ==== (====3).  The following command applies the following resulting script to ‘file1’:

(cat script; echo ´1,$p´) │ ed − file1

FILES

/tmp/d3????? 

SEE ALSO

diff(1)

BUGS

Text lines that consist of a single ‘.’ defeats −e. 

October 24, 1983  —  %W%%Q%%Y%