diff --color options?

[Bruno Haible]

Hi,

GNU diff's current output formats are suitable for monochrome displays.
With today's color displays, it would be possible to display the same
information in a more compact and more intelligible way. I would suggest
two new output formats for diff, each in two variants (--html for HTML
output, otherwise xterm/ANSI color escape sequences):

1) cvsweb like color output. This is like --side-by-side with hunks,
with removed lines (on the left side) in #ff9999, added lines (on the right
side) in #ccccff, and changed lines (on both sides) in #99ff99.

2) ediff like color output. This is like -u with hunks, with old text
in one color and new text in another color, and also inter-line comparison
of the text (see also function fstrcmp()).


Also quite useful would be a variant of the --side-by-side option that
also works well for large file with few differences, i.e. which outputs
hunks, like a mix between context diff and side-by-side:

***********
       Hunk 1 from file A              Hunk 1 from file B
***********
       Hunk 2 from file A              Hunk 2 from file B
***********
       Hunk 3 from file A              Hunk 3 from file B

Bruno