4 latexdiff is a Perl script, which compares two latex files and marks
5 up significant differences between them (i.e. a diff for latex files).
6 Various options are available for visual markup using standard latex
7 packages such as "color.sty". Changes not directly affecting visible
8 text, for example in formatting commands, are still marked in
11 A rudimentary revision facilility is provided by another Perl script,
12 latexrevise, which accepts or rejects all changes. Manual
13 editing of the difference file can be used to override this default
14 behaviour and accept or reject selected changes only.
16 The author is F Tilmann.
21 Perl 5.8 or higher must be installed.
22 The latexdiff script makes use of the Perl package Algorithm::Diff (available
23 from www.cpan.org, current version 1.19). You can either install this package, or
24 use the standalone version of latexdiff, latexdiff-so, which has version 1.15 of
25 this package inlined and does not require external installation of
26 the package. Because latexdiff uses internal functions of Algorithm:Diff whose
27 calling format or availability can change without notice, the preferred method is
28 now to use the standalone version.
30 As an alternative, latexdiff-fast has a modified version of Algorithm::Diff inlined,
31 which internally uses the UNIX diff command. This version is much faster but is dependent
32 on an external "diff" command. Subtle differences in the algorithm of Algorithm::Diff and
33 UNIX-diff mean that the resulting set of differences will generally not be the same as
34 for the standard latexdiff. In most practical cases, these differences are minor, though.
36 INSTALLATION UNIX/LINUX
38 The basic installation procedure is almost trivial:
40 1. Copy latexdiff, latexrevise and latexdiff-vc into a directory which
41 is in the search path and make them executable. If the Algorithm::Diff
42 package is not installed, use latexdiff-so instead of latexdiff.
44 2. Copy latexdiff.1 and latexrevise.1 into the correct man directory
46 3. Optionally create soft links latexdiff-cvs latexdiff-rcs, and
47 latexdiff-svn for latexdiff-vc.
49 The attached Makefile contains example commands to carry out above
50 steps as root for a typical UNIX installation. Type
52 make install (for the stand alone version)
54 make install-ext (for the version using the external Algorithm::Diff)
56 make install-fast (for the version using the UNIX 'diff' function for fast differencing)
58 to get it rolling. You can type
66 to test the respective versions on a brief example before installation
71 Usage instructions are in the manual latexdiff-man.pdf as well as the
76 The directory contrib contains code written by others relating to latexdiff.
77 Currently this directory contains:
79 latexdiff-wrap (Author: V. Kuhlmann) An alternative wrapper script which can be used
80 instead of latexdiff-vc. Its main use is as a template for customised wrapper scripts.
82 latexdiff.spec (Author: T. Doerges) spec file for RPM generation
84 The following contributions were incorporated into the latexdiff code, or inspired me to
85 extend latexdiff in a similar way: J. Paisley, N. Becker, K. Huebner
89 This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
90 it under the terms of the GNU General Public License Version 2 as published by
91 the Free Software Foundation.
93 This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
94 but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
95 MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
96 GNU General Public License for more details (file LICENSE in the