Re: Manual says "diff -uR" but macOS diff doesn't support "-R"

[Ryan Schmidt]

On Aug 11, 2019, at 14:37, Andrew Udvare wrote:

> On Aug 11, 2019, at 14:52, Gerben Wierda wrote:
>> 
>> The manual says:
>> 
>> diff -uR $(port dir $portname) . > change-$portname-maintainer.diff
>> 
>> However, macOS Mojave’s diff doesn’t understand that. -R is an invalid 
>> option. I’m not going to guess here, so what is it supposed to be?
> 
> Install coreutils and then run gdiff.


coreutils does not provide diff or gdiff. diffutils does. But there's no need 
to install this version of diff unless you really want it.

> I believe on BSD diff it's -r.

The manual of diffutils' diff doesn't mention a -R option either; it only 
mentions -r.

Whoever put that in our documentation probably got confused and was thinking of 
cp, which has a deprecated -r option and where you should use -R instead.

I've fixed our documentation.

https://github.com/macports/macports-guide/commit/05aab42697a585ed32604b101397393ac16114f1

Re: Manual says "diff -uR" but macOS diff doesn't support "-R"

[Andrew Udvare]

-- 
Andrew Udvare


> On 2019-08-11, at 15:44, Bill Cole 
>  wrote:
> 
> I feel quite safe guessing that since the argument is a directory, it's a 
> simple capitalization error, and should be 'r' instead of 'R'

I was thinking the same thing. I'm so used to typing diff -urN so often I never 
really noticed.

Re: Manual says "diff -uR" but macOS diff doesn't support "-R"

[Bill Cole]

On 11 Aug 2019, at 14:52, Gerben Wierda wrote:

Busy adopting nsd (currently no maintainer). I have created a Portfile 
for the last version and added Startupitem statements. Everything 
works here.


The manual says:

diff -uR $(port dir $portname) . > change-$portname-maintainer.diff

However, macOS Mojave’s diff doesn’t understand that. -R is an 
invalid option.


It's not valid in any common variety of diff.


I’m not going to guess here, so what is it supposed to be?


I feel quite safe guessing that since the argument is a directory, it's 
a simple capitalization error, and should be 'r' instead of 'R'


--
Bill Cole
b...@scconsult.com or billc...@apache.org
(AKA @grumpybozo and many *@billmail.scconsult.com addresses)

Fwd: Manual says "diff -uR" but macOS diff doesn't support "-R"

[Andrew Udvare]

Sent to the wrong place
Sent from my iPhone

Begin forwarded message:

> From: Andrew Udvare 
> Date: August 11, 2019 at 15:11:26 EDT
> To: Gerben Wierda 
> Subject: Re:  Manual says "diff -uR" but macOS diff doesn't support "-R"
> 
> 
> 
> 
>>> On Aug 11, 2019, at 14:52, Gerben Wierda  wrote:
>>> 
>> Busy adopting nsd (currently no maintainer). I have created a Portfile for 
>> the last version and added Startupitem statements. Everything works here.
>> 
>> The manual says:
>> 
>> diff -uR $(port dir $portname) . > change-$portname-maintainer.diff
>> 
>> However, macOS Mojave’s diff doesn’t understand that. -R is an invalid 
>> option. I’m not going to guess here, so what is it supposed to be?
> 
> Install coreutils and then run gdiff.
> 
> I believe on BSD diff it's -r.

Manual says "diff -uR" but macOS diff doesn't support "-R"

[Gerben Wierda]

Busy adopting nsd (currently no maintainer). I have created a Portfile for the 
last version and added Startupitem statements. Everything works here.

The manual says:

diff -uR $(port dir $portname) . > change-$portname-maintainer.diff

However, macOS Mojave’s diff doesn’t understand that. -R is an invalid option. 
I’m not going to guess here, so what is it supposed to be?

Gerben Wierda
Chess and the Art of Enterprise Architecture 
Mastering ArchiMate 
Architecture for Real Enterprises 
 at InfoWorld
On Slippery Ice  at EAPJ