{git-diff? This is the default.}
endif::git-format-patch[]
+-s::
+--no-patch::
+ Suppress diff output. Useful for commands like `git show` that
+ show the patch by default, or to cancel the effect of `--patch`.
+
-U<n>::
--unified=<n>::
Generate diffs with <n> lines of context instead of
a fraction, with a decimal point before it. I.e., `-M5` becomes
0.5, and is thus the same as `-M50%`. Similarly, `-M05` is
the same as `-M5%`. To limit detection to exact renames, use
- `-M100%`.
+ `-M100%`. The default similarity index is 50%.
-C[<n>]::
--find-copies[=<n>]::
--irreversible-delete::
Omit the preimage for deletes, i.e. print only the header but not
the diff between the preimage and `/dev/null`. The resulting patch
- is not meant to be applied with `patch` nor `git apply`; this is
+ is not meant to be applied with `patch` or `git apply`; this is
solely for people who want to just concentrate on reviewing the
text after the change. In addition, the output obviously lack
enough information to apply such a patch in reverse, even manually,
that matches other criteria, nothing is selected.
-S<string>::
- Look for differences that introduce or remove an instance of
- <string>. Note that this is different than the string simply
- appearing in diff output; see the 'pickaxe' entry in
- linkgit:gitdiffcore[7] for more details.
+ Look for differences that change the number of occurrences of
+ the specified string (i.e. addition/deletion) in a file.
+ Intended for the scripter's use.
++
+It is useful when you're looking for an exact block of code (like a
+struct), and want to know the history of that block since it first
+came into being: use the feature iteratively to feed the interesting
+block in the preimage back into `-S`, and keep going until you get the
+very first version of the block.
-G<regex>::
- Look for differences whose added or removed line matches
- the given <regex>.
+ Look for differences whose patch text contains added/removed
+ lines that match <regex>.
++
+To illustrate the difference between `-S<regex> --pickaxe-regex` and
+`-G<regex>`, consider a commit with the following diff in the same
+file:
++
+----
++ return !regexec(regexp, two->ptr, 1, ®match, 0);
+...
+- hit = !regexec(regexp, mf2.ptr, 1, ®match, 0);
+----
++
+While `git log -G"regexec\(regexp"` will show this commit, `git log
+-S"regexec\(regexp" --pickaxe-regex` will not (because the number of
+occurrences of that string did not change).
++
+See the 'pickaxe' entry in linkgit:gitdiffcore[7] for more
+information.
--pickaxe-all::
When `-S` or `-G` finds a change, show all the changes in that
in <string>.
--pickaxe-regex::
- Make the <string> not a plain string but an extended POSIX
- regex to match.
+ Treat the <string> given to `-S` as an extended POSIX regular
+ expression to match.
endif::git-format-patch[]
-O<orderfile>::
Output the patch in the order specified in the
<orderfile>, which has one shell glob pattern per line.
+ This overrides the `diff.orderfile` configuration variable
+ (see linkgit:git-config[1]). To cancel `diff.orderfile`,
+ use `-O/dev/null`.
ifndef::git-format-patch[]
-R::
differences even if one line has whitespace where the other
line has none.
+--ignore-blank-lines::
+ Ignore changes whose lines are all blank.
+
--inter-hunk-context=<lines>::
Show the context between diff hunks, up to the specified number
of lines, thereby fusing hunks that are close to each other.