patch.1 (20410B)
1 .\"- 2 .\" Copyright 1986, Larry Wall 3 .\" 4 .\" Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without 5 .\" modification, are permitted provided that the following condition 6 .\" is met: 7 .\" 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright 8 .\" notice, this condition and the following disclaimer. 9 .\" 10 .\" THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE AUTHOR AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND 11 .\" ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE 12 .\" IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE 13 .\" ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHOR OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE 14 .\" FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL 15 .\" DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS 16 .\" OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) 17 .\" HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT 18 .\" LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY 19 .\" OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF 20 .\" SUCH DAMAGE. 21 .\" 22 .\" $OpenBSD: patch.1,v 1.26 2010/09/03 11:09:29 jmc Exp $ 23 .\" $FreeBSD$ 24 .Dd January 29, 2013 25 .Dt PATCH 1 26 .Os 27 .Sh NAME 28 .Nm patch 29 .Nd apply a diff file to an original 30 .Sh SYNOPSIS 31 .Nm 32 .Bk -words 33 .Op Fl bCcEeflNnRstuv 34 .Op Fl B Ar backup-prefix 35 .Op Fl D Ar symbol 36 .Op Fl d Ar directory 37 .Op Fl F Ar max-fuzz 38 .Op Fl i Ar patchfile 39 .Op Fl o Ar out-file 40 .Op Fl p Ar strip-count 41 .Op Fl r Ar rej-name 42 .Op Fl V Cm t | nil | never 43 .Op Fl x Ar number 44 .Op Fl z Ar backup-ext 45 .Op Fl Fl posix 46 .Op Ar origfile Op Ar patchfile 47 .Ek 48 .Nm 49 .Pf \*(Lt Ar patchfile 50 .Sh DESCRIPTION 51 .Nm 52 will take a patch file containing any of the four forms of difference 53 listing produced by the 54 .Xr diff 1 55 program and apply those differences to an original file, 56 producing a patched version. 57 If 58 .Ar patchfile 59 is omitted, or is a hyphen, the patch will be read from the standard input. 60 .Pp 61 .Nm 62 will attempt to determine the type of the diff listing, unless overruled by a 63 .Fl c , 64 .Fl e , 65 .Fl n , 66 or 67 .Fl u 68 option. 69 Context diffs (old-style, new-style, and unified) and 70 normal diffs are applied directly by the 71 .Nm 72 program itself, whereas ed diffs are simply fed to the 73 .Xr ed 1 74 editor via a pipe. 75 .Pp 76 If the 77 .Ar patchfile 78 contains more than one patch, 79 .Nm 80 will try to apply each of them as if they came from separate patch files. 81 This means, among other things, that it is assumed that the name of the file 82 to patch must be determined for each diff listing, and that the garbage before 83 each diff listing will be examined for interesting things such as file names 84 and revision level (see the section on 85 .Sx Filename Determination 86 below). 87 .Pp 88 The options are as follows: 89 .Bl -tag -width Ds 90 .It Xo 91 .Fl B Ar backup-prefix , 92 .Fl Fl prefix Ar backup-prefix 93 .Xc 94 Causes the next argument to be interpreted as a prefix to the backup file 95 name. 96 If this argument is specified, any argument to 97 .Fl z 98 will be ignored. 99 .It Fl b , Fl Fl backup 100 Save a backup copy of the file before it is modified. 101 By default the original file is saved with a backup extension of 102 .Qq .orig 103 unless the file already has a numbered backup, in which case a numbered 104 backup is made. 105 This is equivalent to specifying 106 .Qo Fl V Cm existing Qc . 107 This option is currently the default, unless 108 .Fl -posix 109 is specified. 110 .It Fl C , Fl Fl check 111 Checks that the patch would apply cleanly, but does not modify anything. 112 .It Fl c , Fl Fl context 113 Forces 114 .Nm 115 to interpret the patch file as a context diff. 116 .It Xo 117 .Fl D Ar symbol , 118 .Fl Fl ifdef Ar symbol 119 .Xc 120 Causes 121 .Nm 122 to use the 123 .Qq #ifdef...#endif 124 construct to mark changes. 125 The argument following will be used as the differentiating symbol. 126 Note that, unlike the C compiler, there must be a space between the 127 .Fl D 128 and the argument. 129 .It Xo 130 .Fl d Ar directory , 131 .Fl Fl directory Ar directory 132 .Xc 133 Causes 134 .Nm 135 to interpret the next argument as a directory, 136 and change the working directory to it before doing anything else. 137 .It Fl E , Fl Fl remove-empty-files 138 Causes 139 .Nm 140 to remove output files that are empty after the patches have been applied. 141 This option is useful when applying patches that create or remove files. 142 .It Fl e , Fl Fl ed 143 Forces 144 .Nm 145 to interpret the patch file as an 146 .Xr ed 1 147 script. 148 .It Xo 149 .Fl F Ar max-fuzz , 150 .Fl Fl fuzz Ar max-fuzz 151 .Xc 152 Sets the maximum fuzz factor. 153 This option only applies to context diffs, and causes 154 .Nm 155 to ignore up to that many lines in looking for places to install a hunk. 156 Note that a larger fuzz factor increases the odds of a faulty patch. 157 The default fuzz factor is 2, and it may not be set to more than 158 the number of lines of context in the context diff, ordinarily 3. 159 .It Fl f , Fl Fl force 160 Forces 161 .Nm 162 to assume that the user knows exactly what he or she is doing, and to not 163 ask any questions. 164 It assumes the following: 165 skip patches for which a file to patch cannot be found; 166 patch files even though they have the wrong version for the 167 .Qq Prereq: 168 line in the patch; 169 and assume that patches are not reversed even if they look like they are. 170 This option does not suppress commentary; use 171 .Fl s 172 for that. 173 .It Xo 174 .Fl i Ar patchfile , 175 .Fl Fl input Ar patchfile 176 .Xc 177 Causes the next argument to be interpreted as the input file name 178 (i.e. a patchfile). 179 This option may be specified multiple times. 180 .It Fl l , Fl Fl ignore-whitespace 181 Causes the pattern matching to be done loosely, in case the tabs and 182 spaces have been munged in your input file. 183 Any sequence of whitespace in the pattern line will match any sequence 184 in the input file. 185 Normal characters must still match exactly. 186 Each line of the context must still match a line in the input file. 187 .It Fl N , Fl Fl forward 188 Causes 189 .Nm 190 to ignore patches that it thinks are reversed or already applied. 191 See also 192 .Fl R . 193 .It Fl n , Fl Fl normal 194 Forces 195 .Nm 196 to interpret the patch file as a normal diff. 197 .It Xo 198 .Fl o Ar out-file , 199 .Fl Fl output Ar out-file 200 .Xc 201 Causes the next argument to be interpreted as the output file name. 202 .It Xo 203 .Fl p Ar strip-count , 204 .Fl Fl strip Ar strip-count 205 .Xc 206 Sets the pathname strip count, 207 which controls how pathnames found in the patch file are treated, 208 in case you keep your files in a different directory than the person who sent 209 out the patch. 210 The strip count specifies how many slashes are to be stripped from 211 the front of the pathname. 212 (Any intervening directory names also go away.) 213 For example, supposing the file name in the patch file was 214 .Pa /u/howard/src/blurfl/blurfl.c : 215 .Pp 216 Setting 217 .Fl p Ns Ar 0 218 gives the entire pathname unmodified. 219 .Pp 220 .Fl p Ns Ar 1 221 gives 222 .Pp 223 .D1 Pa u/howard/src/blurfl/blurfl.c 224 .Pp 225 without the leading slash. 226 .Pp 227 .Fl p Ns Ar 4 228 gives 229 .Pp 230 .D1 Pa blurfl/blurfl.c 231 .Pp 232 Not specifying 233 .Fl p 234 at all just gives you 235 .Pa blurfl.c , 236 unless all of the directories in the leading path 237 .Pq Pa u/howard/src/blurfl 238 exist and that path is relative, 239 in which case you get the entire pathname unmodified. 240 Whatever you end up with is looked for either in the current directory, 241 or the directory specified by the 242 .Fl d 243 option. 244 .It Fl R , Fl Fl reverse 245 Tells 246 .Nm 247 that this patch was created with the old and new files swapped. 248 (Yes, I'm afraid that does happen occasionally, human nature being what it 249 is.) 250 .Nm 251 will attempt to swap each hunk around before applying it. 252 Rejects will come out in the swapped format. 253 The 254 .Fl R 255 option will not work with ed diff scripts because there is too little 256 information to reconstruct the reverse operation. 257 .Pp 258 If the first hunk of a patch fails, 259 .Nm 260 will reverse the hunk to see if it can be applied that way. 261 If it can, you will be asked if you want to have the 262 .Fl R 263 option set. 264 If it cannot, the patch will continue to be applied normally. 265 (Note: this method cannot detect a reversed patch if it is a normal diff 266 and if the first command is an append (i.e. it should have been a delete) 267 since appends always succeed, due to the fact that a null context will match 268 anywhere. 269 Luckily, most patches add or change lines rather than delete them, so most 270 reversed normal diffs will begin with a delete, which will fail, triggering 271 the heuristic.) 272 .It Xo 273 .Fl r Ar rej-name , 274 .Fl Fl reject-file Ar rej-name 275 .Xc 276 Causes the next argument to be interpreted as the reject file name. 277 .It Xo 278 .Fl s , Fl Fl quiet , 279 .Fl Fl silent 280 .Xc 281 Makes 282 .Nm 283 do its work silently, unless an error occurs. 284 .It Fl t , Fl Fl batch 285 Similar to 286 .Fl f , 287 in that it suppresses questions, but makes some different assumptions: 288 skip patches for which a file to patch cannot be found (the same as 289 .Fl f ) ; 290 skip patches for which the file has the wrong version for the 291 .Qq Prereq: 292 line in the patch; 293 and assume that patches are reversed if they look like they are. 294 .It Fl u , Fl Fl unified 295 Forces 296 .Nm 297 to interpret the patch file as a unified context diff (a unidiff). 298 .It Xo 299 .Fl V Cm t | nil | never , 300 .Fl Fl version-control Cm t | nil | never 301 .Xc 302 Causes the next argument to be interpreted as a method for creating 303 backup file names. 304 The type of backups made can also be given in the 305 .Ev PATCH_VERSION_CONTROL 306 or 307 .Ev VERSION_CONTROL 308 environment variables, which are overridden by this option. 309 The 310 .Fl B 311 option overrides this option, causing the prefix to always be used for 312 making backup file names. 313 The values of the 314 .Ev PATCH_VERSION_CONTROL 315 and 316 .Ev VERSION_CONTROL 317 environment variables and the argument to the 318 .Fl V 319 option are like the GNU Emacs 320 .Dq version-control 321 variable; they also recognize synonyms that are more descriptive. 322 The valid values are (unique abbreviations are accepted): 323 .Bl -tag -width Ds -offset indent 324 .It Cm t , numbered 325 Always make numbered backups. 326 .It Cm nil , existing 327 Make numbered backups of files that already have them, 328 simple backups of the others. 329 .It Cm never , simple 330 Always make simple backups. 331 .El 332 .It Fl v , Fl Fl version 333 Causes 334 .Nm 335 to print out its revision header and patch level. 336 .It Xo 337 .Fl x Ar number , 338 .Fl Fl debug Ar number 339 .Xc 340 Sets internal debugging flags, and is of interest only to 341 .Nm 342 patchers. 343 .It Xo 344 .Fl z Ar backup-ext , 345 .Fl Fl suffix Ar backup-ext 346 .Xc 347 Causes the next argument to be interpreted as the backup extension, to be 348 used in place of 349 .Qq .orig . 350 .It Fl Fl posix 351 Enables strict 352 .St -p1003.1-2008 353 conformance, specifically: 354 .Bl -enum 355 .It 356 Backup files are not created unless the 357 .Fl b 358 option is specified. 359 .It 360 If unspecified, the file name used is the first of the old, new and 361 index files that exists. 362 .El 363 .El 364 .Ss Patch Application 365 .Nm 366 will try to skip any leading garbage, apply the diff, 367 and then skip any trailing garbage. 368 Thus you could feed an article or message containing a 369 diff listing to 370 .Nm , 371 and it should work. 372 If the entire diff is indented by a consistent amount, 373 this will be taken into account. 374 .Pp 375 With context diffs, and to a lesser extent with normal diffs, 376 .Nm 377 can detect when the line numbers mentioned in the patch are incorrect, 378 and will attempt to find the correct place to apply each hunk of the patch. 379 As a first guess, it takes the line number mentioned for the hunk, plus or 380 minus any offset used in applying the previous hunk. 381 If that is not the correct place, 382 .Nm 383 will scan both forwards and backwards for a set of lines matching the context 384 given in the hunk. 385 First 386 .Nm 387 looks for a place where all lines of the context match. 388 If no such place is found, and it's a context diff, and the maximum fuzz factor 389 is set to 1 or more, then another scan takes place ignoring the first and last 390 line of context. 391 If that fails, and the maximum fuzz factor is set to 2 or more, 392 the first two and last two lines of context are ignored, 393 and another scan is made. 394 .Pq The default maximum fuzz factor is 2. 395 .Pp 396 If 397 .Nm 398 cannot find a place to install that hunk of the patch, it will put the hunk 399 out to a reject file, which normally is the name of the output file plus 400 .Qq .rej . 401 (Note that the rejected hunk will come out in context diff form whether the 402 input patch was a context diff or a normal diff. 403 If the input was a normal diff, many of the contexts will simply be null.) 404 The line numbers on the hunks in the reject file may be different than 405 in the patch file: they reflect the approximate location patch thinks the 406 failed hunks belong in the new file rather than the old one. 407 .Pp 408 As each hunk is completed, you will be told whether the hunk succeeded or 409 failed, and which line (in the new file) 410 .Nm 411 thought the hunk should go on. 412 If this is different from the line number specified in the diff, 413 you will be told the offset. 414 A single large offset MAY be an indication that a hunk was installed in the 415 wrong place. 416 You will also be told if a fuzz factor was used to make the match, in which 417 case you should also be slightly suspicious. 418 .Ss Filename Determination 419 If no original file is specified on the command line, 420 .Nm 421 will try to figure out from the leading garbage what the name of the file 422 to edit is. 423 When checking a prospective file name, pathname components are stripped 424 as specified by the 425 .Fl p 426 option and the file's existence and writability are checked relative 427 to the current working directory (or the directory specified by the 428 .Fl d 429 option). 430 .Pp 431 If the diff is a context or unified diff, 432 .Nm 433 is able to determine the old and new file names from the diff header. 434 For context diffs, the 435 .Dq old 436 file is specified in the line beginning with 437 .Qq *** 438 and the 439 .Dq new 440 file is specified in the line beginning with 441 .Qq --- . 442 For a unified diff, the 443 .Dq old 444 file is specified in the line beginning with 445 .Qq --- 446 and the 447 .Dq new 448 file is specified in the line beginning with 449 .Qq +++ . 450 If there is an 451 .Qq Index: 452 line in the leading garbage (regardless of the diff type), 453 .Nm 454 will use the file name from that line as the 455 .Dq index 456 file. 457 .Pp 458 .Nm 459 will choose the file name by performing the following steps, with the first 460 match used: 461 .Bl -enum 462 .It 463 If 464 .Nm 465 is operating in strict 466 .St -p1003.1-2008 467 mode, the first of the 468 .Dq old , 469 .Dq new 470 and 471 .Dq index 472 file names that exist is used. 473 Otherwise, 474 .Nm 475 will examine either the 476 .Dq old 477 and 478 .Dq new 479 file names or, for a non-context diff, the 480 .Dq index 481 file name, and choose the file name with the fewest path components, 482 the shortest basename, and the shortest total file name length (in that order). 483 .It 484 If no file exists, 485 .Nm 486 checks for the existence of the files in an SCCS or RCS directory 487 (using the appropriate prefix or suffix) using the criteria specified 488 above. 489 If found, 490 .Nm 491 will attempt to get or check out the file. 492 .It 493 If no suitable file was found to patch, the patch file is a context or 494 unified diff, and the old file was zero length, the new file name is 495 created and used. 496 .It 497 If the file name still cannot be determined, 498 .Nm 499 will prompt the user for the file name to use. 500 .El 501 .Pp 502 Additionally, if the leading garbage contains a 503 .Qq Prereq:\ \& 504 line, 505 .Nm 506 will take the first word from the prerequisites line (normally a version 507 number) and check the input file to see if that word can be found. 508 If not, 509 .Nm 510 will ask for confirmation before proceeding. 511 .Pp 512 The upshot of all this is that you should be able to say, while in a news 513 interface, the following: 514 .Pp 515 .Dl | patch -d /usr/src/local/blurfl 516 .Pp 517 and patch a file in the blurfl directory directly from the article containing 518 the patch. 519 .Ss Backup Files 520 By default, the patched version is put in place of the original, with 521 the original file backed up to the same name with the extension 522 .Qq .orig , 523 or as specified by the 524 .Fl B , 525 .Fl V , 526 or 527 .Fl z 528 options. 529 The extension used for making backup files may also be specified in the 530 .Ev SIMPLE_BACKUP_SUFFIX 531 environment variable, which is overridden by the options above. 532 .Pp 533 If the backup file is a symbolic or hard link to the original file, 534 .Nm 535 creates a new backup file name by changing the first lowercase letter 536 in the last component of the file's name into uppercase. 537 If there are no more lowercase letters in the name, 538 it removes the first character from the name. 539 It repeats this process until it comes up with a 540 backup file that does not already exist or is not linked to the original file. 541 .Pp 542 You may also specify where you want the output to go with the 543 .Fl o 544 option; if that file already exists, it is backed up first. 545 .Ss Notes For Patch Senders 546 There are several things you should bear in mind if you are going to 547 be sending out patches: 548 .Pp 549 First, you can save people a lot of grief by keeping a 550 .Pa patchlevel.h 551 file which is patched to increment the patch level as the first diff in the 552 patch file you send out. 553 If you put a 554 .Qq Prereq: 555 line in with the patch, it will not let them apply 556 patches out of order without some warning. 557 .Pp 558 Second, make sure you have specified the file names right, either in a 559 context diff header, or with an 560 .Qq Index: 561 line. 562 If you are patching something in a subdirectory, be sure to tell the patch 563 user to specify a 564 .Fl p 565 option as needed. 566 .Pp 567 Third, you can create a file by sending out a diff that compares a 568 null file to the file you want to create. 569 This will only work if the file you want to create does not exist already in 570 the target directory. 571 .Pp 572 Fourth, take care not to send out reversed patches, since it makes people wonder 573 whether they already applied the patch. 574 .Pp 575 Fifth, while you may be able to get away with putting 582 diff listings into 576 one file, it is probably wiser to group related patches into separate files in 577 case something goes haywire. 578 .Sh ENVIRONMENT 579 .Bl -tag -width "PATCH_VERSION_CONTROL" -compact 580 .It Ev POSIXLY_CORRECT 581 When set, 582 .Nm 583 behaves as if the 584 .Fl Fl posix 585 option has been specified. 586 .It Ev SIMPLE_BACKUP_SUFFIX 587 Extension to use for backup file names instead of 588 .Qq .orig . 589 .It Ev TMPDIR 590 Directory to put temporary files in; default is 591 .Pa /tmp . 592 .It Ev PATCH_VERSION_CONTROL 593 Selects when numbered backup files are made. 594 .It Ev VERSION_CONTROL 595 Same as 596 .Ev PATCH_VERSION_CONTROL . 597 .El 598 .Sh FILES 599 .Bl -tag -width "$TMPDIR/patch*" -compact 600 .It Pa $TMPDIR/patch* 601 .Nm 602 temporary files 603 .It Pa /dev/tty 604 used to read input when 605 .Nm 606 prompts the user 607 .El 608 .Sh EXIT STATUS 609 The 610 .Nm 611 utility exits with one of the following values: 612 .Pp 613 .Bl -tag -width Ds -offset indent -compact 614 .It 0 615 Successful completion. 616 .It 1 617 One or more lines were written to a reject file. 618 .It \*(Gt1 619 An error occurred. 620 .El 621 .Pp 622 When applying a set of patches in a loop it behooves you to check this 623 exit status so you do not apply a later patch to a partially patched file. 624 .Sh DIAGNOSTICS 625 Too many to list here, but generally indicative that 626 .Nm 627 couldn't parse your patch file. 628 .Pp 629 The message 630 .Qq Hmm... 631 indicates that there is unprocessed text in the patch file and that 632 .Nm 633 is attempting to intuit whether there is a patch in that text and, if so, 634 what kind of patch it is. 635 .Sh SEE ALSO 636 .Xr diff 1 637 .Sh STANDARDS 638 The 639 .Nm 640 utility is compliant with the 641 .St -p1003.1-2008 642 specification 643 (except as detailed above for the 644 .Fl -posix 645 option), 646 though the presence of 647 .Nm 648 itself is optional. 649 .Pp 650 The flags 651 .Op Fl BCEFfstVvxz 652 and 653 .Op Fl -posix 654 are extensions to that specification. 655 .Sh AUTHORS 656 .An Larry Wall 657 with many other contributors. 658 .Sh CAVEATS 659 .Nm 660 cannot tell if the line numbers are off in an ed script, and can only detect 661 bad line numbers in a normal diff when it finds a 662 .Qq change 663 or a 664 .Qq delete 665 command. 666 A context diff using fuzz factor 3 may have the same problem. 667 Until a suitable interactive interface is added, you should probably do 668 a context diff in these cases to see if the changes made sense. 669 Of course, compiling without errors is a pretty good indication that the patch 670 worked, but not always. 671 .Pp 672 .Nm 673 usually produces the correct results, even when it has to do a lot of 674 guessing. 675 However, the results are guaranteed to be correct only when the patch is 676 applied to exactly the same version of the file that the patch was 677 generated from. 678 .Sh BUGS 679 Could be smarter about partial matches, excessively deviant offsets and 680 swapped code, but that would take an extra pass. 681 .Pp 682 Check patch mode 683 .Pq Fl C 684 will fail if you try to check several patches in succession that build on 685 each other. 686 The entire 687 .Nm 688 code would have to be restructured to keep temporary files around so that it 689 can handle this situation. 690 .Pp 691 If code has been duplicated (for instance with #ifdef OLDCODE ... #else ... 692 #endif), 693 .Nm 694 is incapable of patching both versions, and, if it works at all, will likely 695 patch the wrong one, and tell you that it succeeded to boot. 696 .Pp 697 If you apply a patch you have already applied, 698 .Nm 699 will think it is a reversed patch, and offer to un-apply the patch. 700 This could be construed as a feature.