Compare source code files, ignoring formatting differences (like whitespace, linebreaks, ...)

Solution 1:

You can use dwdiff. From man dwdiff:

dwdiff - a delimited word diff program

Program is very clever - see dwdiff --help:

$ dwdiff --help
Usage: dwdiff [OPTIONS] <OLD FILE> <NEW FILE>
-h, --help                             Print this help message
-v, --version                          Print version and copyright information
-d <delim>, --delimiters=<delim>       Specify delimiters
-P, --punctuation                      Use punctuation characters as delimiters
-W <ws>, --white-space=<ws>            Specify whitespace characters
-u, --diff-input                       Read the input as the output from diff
-S[<marker>], --paragraph-separator[=<marker>]  Show inserted or deleted blocks
                               of empty lines, optionally overriding the marker
-1, --no-deleted                       Do not print deleted words
-2, --no-inserted                      Do not print inserted words
-3, --no-common                        Do not print common words
-L[<width>], --line-numbers[<width>]   Prepend line numbers
-C<num>, --context=<num>               Show <num> lines of context
-s, --statistics                       Print statistics when done
--wdiff-output                         Produce wdiff compatible output
-i, --ignore-case                      Ignore differences in case
-I, --ignore-formatting                Ignore formatting differences
-m <num>, --match-context=<num>        Use <num> words of context for matching
--aggregate-changes                    Allow close changes to aggregate
-A <alg>, --algorithm=<alg>            Choose algorithm: best, normal, fast
-c[<spec>], --color[=<spec>]           Color mode
-l, --less-mode                        As -p but also overstrike whitespace
-p, --printer                          Use overstriking and bold text
-w <string>, --start-delete=<string>   String to mark begin of deleted text
-x <string>, --stop-delete=<string>    String to mark end of deleted text
-y <string>, --start-insert=<string>   String to mark begin of inserted text
-z <string>, --stop-insert=<string>    String to mark end of inserted text
-R, --repeat-markers                   Repeat markers at newlines
--profile=<name>                       Use profile <name>
--no-profile                           Disable profile reading

Test it with:

cat << EOF > test_diff1.txt
    else if (prop == "P1") { return 0; }
EOF

cat << EOF > test_diff2.txt
    else if (prop == "P1") {
        return 0;
    }
EOF

Then launch comparison:

$ dwdiff test_diff1.txt test_diff2.txt --statistics
    else if (prop == "P1") {
        return 0;
    }
old: 9 words  9 100% common  0 0% deleted  0 0% changed
new: 9 words  9 100% common  0 0% inserted  0 0% changed

Please note 100% common above.

Solution 2:

I doubt this is something that diff can do. If there are space changes within a line, then it will work (or other similar programs like kompare). At worse, you can do a search-and-replace and collapse tab characters, etc. But what you're asking for whitespace changes beyond a line...

You would need a program that understands the C++ language. Note that all languages are different and Python, in particular, uses whitespace to define code blocks. As such, I doubt any general diff-like program would work with "any" (or a specific) programming language.

You might consider some kind of parser to go through the two source files and then compare the outputs of this parser.

This is beyond my background, but I suggest you look into Lex and Yacc. These are Wikipedia pages; you might want to take a look at this page which gives a concise explanation and an example.