DiffPlex is C# library to generate textual diffs. It is a PCL (portable) library that targets .NET 4.0, Silverlight 5.0, Windows 8.0, Windows Phone 8.0, Windows Phone Appx 8.1
The DiffPlex library currently exposes two interfaces for generating diffs:
-
IDiffer (implemented by the Differ class) - This is the core diffing class. It exposes the low level functions to generate differences between texts.
-
ISidebySideDiffer (implemented by the SideBySideDiffer class) - This is a higher level interface. It consumes the IDiffer interface and generates a SideBySideDiffModel. This is a model which is suited for displaying the differences of two peices of text in a side by side view.
For examples of how to use the API please see the the following projets contained in the DiffPlex solution.
For use of the IDiffer interface see:
- SidebySideDiffer.cs contained in the DiffPlex Project.
- UnidiffFormater.cs contained in the DiffPlex.ConsoleRunner project.
For use of the ISidebySideDiffer interface see:
- DiffController.cs and associated MVC views in the WebDiffer project
- TextBoxDiffRenderer.cs in the SilverlightDiffer project
/// <summary>
/// Provides methods for generate differences between texts
/// </summary>
public interface IDiffer
{
/// <summary>
/// Create a diff by comparing text line by line
/// </summary>
/// <param name="oldText">The old text.</param>
/// <param name="newText">The new text.</param>
/// <param name="ignoreWhiteSpace">if set to <c>true</c> will ignore white space when determining if lines are the same.</param>
/// <returns>A DiffResult object which details the differences</returns>
DiffResult CreateLineDiffs(string oldText, string newText, bool ignoreWhiteSpace);
/// <summary>
/// Create a diff by comparing text character by character
/// </summary>
/// <param name="oldText">The old text.</param>
/// <param name="newText">The new text.</param>
/// <param name="ignoreWhitespace">if set to <c>true</c> will treat all whitespace characters are empty strings.</param>
/// <returns>A DiffResult object which details the differences</returns>
DiffResult CreateCharacterDiffs(string oldText, string newText, bool ignoreWhitespace);
/// <summary>
/// Create a diff by comparing text word by word
/// </summary>
/// <param name="oldText">The old text.</param>
/// <param name="newText">The new text.</param>
/// <param name="ignoreWhitespace">if set to <c>true</c> will ignore white space when determining if words are the same.</param>
/// <param name="separators">The list of characters which define word separators.</param>
/// <returns>A DiffResult object which details the differences</returns>
DiffResult CreateWordDiffs(string oldText, string newText, bool ignoreWhitespace, char[] separators);
/// <summary>
/// Create a diff by comparing text in chunks determined by the supplied chunker function.
/// </summary>
/// <param name="oldText">The old text.</param>
/// <param name="newText">The new text.</param>
/// <param name="ignoreWhiteSpace">if set to <c>true</c> will ignore white space when determining if chunks are the same.</param>
/// <param name="chunker">A function that will break the text into chunks.</param>
/// <returns>A DiffResult object which details the differences</returns>
DiffResult CreateCustomDiffs(string oldText, string newText, bool ignoreWhiteSpace, Func<string, string[]> chunker);
}
/// <summary>
/// Provides methods that generate differences between texts for displaying in a side by side view.
/// </summary>
public interface ISideBySideDiffBuilder
{
/// <summary>
/// Builds a diff model for displaying diffs in a side by side view
/// </summary>
/// <param name="oldText">The old text.</param>
/// <param name="newText">The new text.</param>
/// <returns>The side by side diff model</returns>
SideBySideDiffModel BuildDiffModel(string oldText, string newText);
}
DiffPlex also contains a sample website that shows how to create a basic side by side diff in an ASP MVC website
