diff should not follow sym-link

I do not know what is the historical reason for program diff to follow a symbolic link during the recursive diff (-r), but it seems not to be a proper implementation. If both compared directories contains a sym-link, which point to a same file or directory, it obviously no need to compare it

problem of boot/reboot from SimpleTech SP-U25/60 USB drive on PCG-6J2L

This is my first time to install FreeBSD 5.x/6.x on a USB drive, so I am not sure if the boot/reboot problem is particular to this drive (SimpleTech SP-U25/60), or it is a generic USB issue (I do not have a second USB drive to confirm the problem). This USB device contains a WDC WD60

command line switch to disable following symlink in DIFF program

Is diff program supposed to have a switch at command line to disable following (ignore) symbolic links when -r switch is given, like many other programs do? In many places, a directory or source file can be symbolically linked multiple times to different archives. Since the original source