views:

211

answers:

2

Hi, The default patch file viewer is messy (ie. no side by side diff view etc). I tried setting the path of beyondCompare exe in "Settings->Unified Diff Viewer->custom", but beyond compare also behaves same as default diff tool. Is there a way to atleast allow side by side diff in patch files ? If so, what is the method ? My aim is to allow emailing of changes so that they can be reviewed before I commit them :)

Mishal

+1  A: 

I've never found any, but the solution that I usually use is to simply apply the patch file to a pristine checkout of the tree, and then do a "regular" diff (my preferred tool is diffuse) to review the changes in context.

The problem with "raw" patch files is that they only provide a few lines of context before and after the change, which often isn't enough.

If you don't like the patch, simply revert the changes and don't commit!

Dean Harding
ok, yes that sounds do-able. Well I did find a way while I was trying to follow what you said. While doing 'apply patch' it does let us preview the changes in each file of the patch before they are applied. The only issue with patch is that, as you mentioned, it only contains the lines of code which changed, and not the complete "before" and "after" files. So its necessary that the code must be present on the system.Well...thanks.
mishal153
well...im gonna mark this as correct since there does not seem to be any other logical posibility to achieve what i originally wanted with just a patch file :) (since it contains too less information).
mishal153
A: 

I like to use KDiff3, it's packed with functions, very user friendly and available for all popular platforms. It can also integrate with TortoiseSVN.

Beerdude26
beyond compare is actually compatible with SVN for normal diff. So thats not a problem. Problem is viewing patch files in normal diff style (2 panes left and right, showing before and after).
mishal153