jejones@ea.UUCP (12/30/85)
I found myself the other day having to compare a couple of files of
assembly-language source. They weren't related purely ancestrally,
because I'd "improved" the commentary in my version, so that when I
ran (the closest thing I had to) diff on them, a lot of purely cosmetic
tweakings (fixes to misspellings, etc.) showed up that I had to filter
out myself.
So, here's the $2**6 question: has anyone done for diff what got done
for sort, i.e. let the user select just what it is he wishes to use as
the criterion/criteria for two lines being "the same?" It strikes me
as an obvious hack, and not hard to do. ("So why don't you do it?" you
ask...well, I don't have source to diff. I'm quite liable to hack what
I *do* have source to, though.)
James Jones