CODEWITHSUNDEEP
git
user2567544
user2567544

Reputation: 587

How to improve git diff output when commenting sections of code

I quite often find myself making a small change to a file that takes a long time time to run. The workflow is something like this:

<small edit to foo>
git add foo
<comment out huge swathe of foo which doesn't need testing>
<test change>
git restore foo

Works well. The only thing is, I like to check before git restore-ing that the commenting is the only change that will be lost. And it's here that I feel let down by git, and most of the other many diff tools I've configured git with.

I would expect that viewing a diff between a block of code in the index like this:

#
# JIRA-001: Do a thing
#

foo <<-EOF
    foo1
EOF

#
# JIRA-002: Do another thing
#

foo <<-EOF
    foo2
EOF

and a working copy that looks like this:

##
## JIRA-001: Do a thing
##
#
#foo <<-EOF
#    foo1
#EOF
#
##
## JIRA-002: Do another thing
##
#
#foo <<-EOF
#    foo2
#EOF

would make it trivial to see that the difference is simply that a hash has been prepended to a range of lines. But it's often not straightforward to tell, as the diff is presented in multiple hunks of removed and added lines, sometimes interleaved in such a way as to leave me unclear if an additional change has found it's way in.

In addition to running git diff I have also tried `git diff --word-diff-regex=. with somewhat better, but still to my mind not ideal, results. I have also tried all the different values for --diff-algorithm which makes no difference.

Can anyone suggest a way of viewing these diffs that will circumvent this issue?

Attaching partial outputs of git diff and git diff --word-diff-regex=. for comparison.

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Upvotes: 3

Views: 247

Answers (1)

jthill
jthill

Reputation: 60305

To avoid the rampant punning, use a more distinguishable marker and tell the word diff about it:

$ git diff --word-diff-regex='#.|.' test test2
diff --git a/test b/test2
index 11c83b7..d92fc45 100644
--- a/test
+++ b/test2
@@ -1,15 +1,15 @@
{+#x+}#
{+#x+}# JIRA-001: Do a thing
{+#x+}#
{+#x+}
{+#x+}foo <<-EOF
{+#x+}    foo1
{+#x+}EOF
{+#x+}
{+#x+}#
{+#x+}# JIRA-002: Do another thing
{+#x+}#
{+#x+}
{+#x+}foo <<-EOF
{+#x+}    foo2
{+#x+}EOF

Upvotes: 1

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