diff-so-fancy strives to make your diffs human readable instead of machine readable. This helps improve code quality and helps you spot defects faster.
Vanilla git diff vs git and diff-so-fancy
Simply copy the diff-so-fancy script from the latest release into your $PATH and you're done. Alternately to test development features you can clone this repo and then put the diff-so-fancy script (symlink will work) into your $PATH. The lib/ directory will need to be kept relative to the core script.
If you are using a ZSH framework like zgenom or oh-my-zsh, refer to Zsh plugin support for diff-so-fancy for detailed installation instructions.
diff-so-fancy is also available from the NPM registry, brew, as a package on Nix, Fedora, in the Arch extra repo, and as ppa:aos for Debian/Ubuntu Linux.
Issues relating to packaging ('installation does not work', 'version is out of date', etc.) should be directed to those packages' own repositories/issue trackers where applicable. Issues relating to packaging ("installation does not work", "version is out of date", etc.) should be directed to those packages' repositories/issue trackers where applicable.
Note: Windows users may need to install MinGW or the Windows subsystem for Linux.
Configure git to use diff-so-fancy for all diff output:
git config --global core.pager "diff-so-fancy | less --tabs=4 -RF"
git config --global interactive.diffFilter "diff-so-fancy --patch"The default Git colors are not optimal. The colors used for the screenshot above were:
git config --global color.ui true
git config --global color.diff-highlight.oldNormal "red bold"
git config --global color.diff-highlight.oldHighlight "red bold 52"
git config --global color.diff-highlight.newNormal "green bold"
git config --global color.diff-highlight.newHighlight "green bold 22"
git config --global color.diff.meta "11"
git config --global color.diff.frag "magenta bold"
git config --global color.diff.func "146 bold"
git config --global color.diff.commit "yellow bold"
git config --global color.diff.old "red bold"
git config --global color.diff.new "green bold"
git config --global color.diff.whitespace "red reverse"Use -u with diff for unified output, and pipe the output to diff-so-fancy:
diff -u file_a file_b | diff-so-fancyIt also supports the recursive mode of diff with -r or --recursive as first argument
diff -r -u folder_a folder_b | diff-so-fancydiff --recursive -u folder_a folder_b | diff-so-fancyShould the first block of an empty line be colored. (Default: true)
git config --bool --global diff-so-fancy.markEmptyLines falseSimplify git header chunks to a more human readable format. (Default: true)
git config --bool --global diff-so-fancy.changeHunkIndicators falseShould the pesky + or - at line-start be removed. (Default: true)
git config --bool --global diff-so-fancy.stripLeadingSymbols falseBy default, the separator for the file header uses Unicode line-drawing characters.
If this is causing output errors on your terminal, set this to false to use
ASCII characters instead. (Default: true)
git config --bool --global diff-so-fancy.useUnicodeRuler falseBy default, the separator for the file header spans the full width of the terminal. Use this setting to set the width of the file header manually.
git config --global diff-so-fancy.rulerWidth 80By default, show both top & bottom horizontal ruler.
git config --bool --global diff-so-fancy.hideTopRuler false
git config --bool --global diff-so-fancy.hideBottomRuler false
# __OR__ use the command line options to hide the ruler
diff-so-fancy -U # hide top ruler, -U is short for --no-thr
diff-so-fancy -D # hide bottom ruler, -D is short for --no-bhr
# __OR__ use the command line options to show the ruler
diff-so-fancy -u # show top ruler, -u is short for --show-thr
diff-so-fancy -d # show bottom ruler, -d is short for --show-bhrNOTE the priority (show)-u/-d > (hide)-U/-D > hideTopRuler/hideBottomRuler
- if default config to show, it is easy to hide it use cmd args of
-U/-D - if default config to hide, it is easy to show it use cmd args of
-u/-d
By default, if a ruler is to hide, then it will be replaced by an newline.
- A: if a ruler is going to hide, then make it replaced by an newline
- This is controled by
-x, the default is ON
- This is controled by
- B: if a ruler is to be showing, then make it replaced by an newline
- This is controled by
-X, the default is OFF
- This is controled by
# -X tells to replace both showing ruler with newline
diff-so-fancy -X ### both rulers are newline ###
# -X make showing bottom newline, -U make hidding top newline
diff-so-fancy -X -U ### both rulers are newline ###
# -X make showing top newline, -U make hidding bottom newline
diff-so-fancy -X -D ### both rulers are newline ###
# -X make showing bottom newline, -U -x make top completely hidding
diff-so-fancy -X -U -x # no top ruler, bottom ruler newline
diff-so-fancy -x -U # no top ruler, bottom ruler dash
# -X make showing top newline, -D -x make bottom completely hidding
diff-so-fancy -X -D -x # no bottom ruler, top ruler newline
diff-so-fancy -x -D # no bottom ruler, top ruler dash
diff-so-fancy -x -U -D # completely hide both ruler at allBy default, the section char is set to unicode wide char ◯, If this is causing
output errors on your terminal, then you can reset it to other char or make it
completely none.
git config --global diff-so-fancy.sectionChar "" # set to none
git config --global diff-so-fancy.sectionChar "DIFF" # set to DIFF
# __OR__ use the command line options
diff-so-fancy --use-sc "DIFF" # set to any chars you like
diff-so-fancy -N # none, -N is short for --no-section-char| Person | Role |
|---|---|
| @scottchiefbaker | Project lead |
| @OJFord | Bug triage |
| @GenieTim | Travis OSX fixes |
| @AOS | Debian packager |
| @Stevemao/@Paul Irish | NPM release team |
Pull requests are quite welcome, and should target the next branch. We are also looking for any feedback or ideas on how to make diff-so-fancy even fancier.
- Delta
- Lazygit with diff-so-fancy integration
MIT