Re: [PATCH] Allow combined diff to ignore white-spaces

From: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
Date: Mar 4, 2013, 18:36 UTC
Message-ID: <7vy5e3vwos.fsf@alter.siamese.dyndns.org>
In-Reply-To: <CALWbr2z0eok-VOQX7DDZafevQUi7asCv_tD8=y6XA2PVYf52AQ@mail.gmail.com>

Antoine Pelisse <apelisse@gmail.com> writes:

> It feels incorrect to me to coalsesce "- 5" and "-  5" as it might
> look incorrect to the user. But still the idea is appealing.

The users already need to see that when reading a regular patch with one or more context lines and -b/-w/etc., anyway. The context lines are made into context only because whitespace differences were ignored, and in the regular unified patch format we can show only one version, either from preimage or from postimage, and have to pick one. Coalescing "- 5" and "- 5" into "--5" or "-- 5" by picking one or the other is the same thing, no?

> Using the exact example you gave, and running the latest next, I have
> this output, where 11 is not coalesced.
> Is that a bug ?

It could be tickling a corner case because the removal is at the end of the file. Perhaps adding 12 that is all common across three versions and see what happens?