Re: context diffs: why have ! stand for two different things?

[Paul Eggert]

> From: Russ Allbery <address@hidden>
> Date: Sun, 02 Jun 2002 20:04:30 -0700
> 
> I'm afraid that the syntax for context diffs is at this point pretty much
> set in stone,

Certainly the "!" part is, but there are still a few corners that are
muddy rather than stony.  For example, POSIX 1003.1-2001 requires
behavior like the following:

          $ touch empty
          $ echo hello >oneline
          $ diff -c empty oneline
          *** empty     Fri May 10 12:22:48 2002
          --- oneline   Fri May 10 12:22:58 2002
          ***************
          *** 1,0 ****
          --- 1,1 ----
          + hello

but, with every diff that I know of, the last three lines look like
this instead:

          *** 0 ****
          --- 1 ----
          + hello

I think this is a bug in POSIX, not in diff, so last month I filed a
POSIX defect report on this issue.