sbase/cmp.1
FRIGN 79e45395e5 Refactor cmp(1) code and manpage
The algorithm had some areas which had potential for improvement.
This should make cmp(1) faster.
There have been changes to behaviour as well:

1) If argv[0] and argv[1] are the same, cmp(1) returns Same.
2) POSIX specifies the format of the difference-message to be:
      "%s %s differ: char %d, line %d\n", file1, file2,
      <byte number>, <line number>
   However, as cmp(1) operates on bytes, not characters, I changed
   it to
      "%s %s differ: byte %d, line %d\n", file1, file2,
      <byte number>, <line number>
   This is one example where the standard just keeps the old format
   for backwards-compatibility. As this is harmful, this change
   makes sense in the sense of consistentcy (and because we take
   the difference of char and byte very seriously in sbase, as
   opposed to GNU coreutils).

The manpage has been annotated, reflecting the second change, and
sections shortened where possible.
Thus I marked cmp(1) as finished in README.
2015-02-07 21:05:33 +01:00

53 lines
780 B
Groff

.Dd February 7, 2015
.Dt CMP 1
.Os sbase
.Sh NAME
.Nm cmp
.Nd compare two files
.Sh SYNOPSIS
.Nm
.Op Fl l | Fl s
.Ar file1 file2
.Sh DESCRIPTION
.Nm
compares
.Ar file1
and
.Ar file2
byte by byte. If they differ,
.Nm
writes the first differing byte- and line-number to stdout.
.Sh OPTIONS
.Bl -tag -width Ds
.It Fl l
Print byte-number and bytes (in octal) for each difference.
.It Fl s
Print nothing and only return status.
.El
.Sh EXIT STATUS
.Bl -tag -width Ds
.It 0
.Ar file1
and
.Ar file2
are identical.
.It 1
.Ar file1
and
.Ar file2
are different.
.It > 1
An error occurred.
.El
.Sh SEE ALSO
.Xr comm 1 ,
.Xr diff 1
.Sh STANDARDS
The
.Nm
utility is compliant with the
.St -p1003.1-2008
specification.
.Pp
The "char" in the default result format has been replaced with "byte".