Re: Program to compare two directory trees

From: Peter Ammon (peter_ammon_at_rocketmail.com)
Date: 09/25/04 

Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 16:26:55 -0700

Norm Dresner wrote:
> "James Antill" <james-netnews@and.org> wrote in message
> news:pan.2004.09.24.17.57.29.757033@and.org...
>
>>On Thu, 23 Sep 2004 19:21:41 +0000, Norm Dresner wrote:
>>
>>
>>>In the distant past I wrote my own program to recursively traverse two
>>>parallel directory trees (each at arbitrary depth from the root) and
>
> list
>
>>>the differences between them. The program used (IIRC) stat() to get
>
> file
>
>>>sizes and dates and printed a line on the output for each mismatch.
>>>
>>>I find myself needing something like this again, but this time I don't
>
> care
>
>>>about the sizes or dates, just the (non-)existence of the files. Before
>
> I
>
>>>reinvent the wheel, is there a (pseudo) standard utility available that
>
> will
>
>>>do this. I'm less likely to make stupid errors that would invalidate my
>>>explorations if I can use a pre-tested program than if I have to study
>
> and
>
>>>try to understand code I wrote over a decade ago.
>>
>> diff -qru <dir> <dir>
>
>
> Yeah, several people have pointed out that modern versions of diff will do
> that. The original program was written back in the '80s for a VAX running a
> UNIX-like OS. Ah, progress ...
>
> Thanks to all who answered.
>
> Norm

Sorry, I don't see the original response, which is why I'm replying
here. My second reaction to this was diff as well, but won't diff
report differences in the files' contents, not merely the existence of
the files? The OP appears to want different files with the same name to
be considered the same, and AFAIK diff cannot do that.

My first reaction was to use find to enumerate the directory contents in
each directory, and then diff to compare them.

-Peter

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