Diffing

April 15, 2024

daybook, vcs | permalink

There are (at least) two ways to view the diff of both an untracked file and tracked-but-changed/not-staged files in git.

1. Add the untracked file, run git diff HEAD. If it turns out you don't want that file added, just follow the command shown on with git status: git restore --staged <file>.

2. Use the -N (--intent-to-add) flag in git add, which "record[s] only the fact that the path will be added later" (from git add --help). As the help continues, "This is useful for, among other things, showing the unstaged content of such files with git diff and committing them with git commit -a."

Not sure which way I'll settle on, but I'm glad I finally looked into it. I generally do the first version, but only because I didn't know any other way. And before I end up doing that, I usually think there is some simple flag I'm missing with git diff that'll do what I want, before realizing - once again - that there's not.