Diff command with file type exceptions

Question

While comparing 2 fairly big directories using diff -rq .... I want to exclude certain file types like 'tar.gz' or 'error_log'.

How do I do that?

Thomas Dickey · Accepted Answer · 2015-11-14 15:01:48Z

GNU diff has options for doing this (see manual page):

   -x, --exclude=PAT
          exclude files that match PAT

   -X, --exclude-from=FILE
          exclude files that match any pattern in FILE

The pattern in each case is a glob (* for any number of characters):

diff -rq -x '*.tar.gz' -x '*error_log' foo bar

See for example:

Thanks! Should have seen the '-- help' option. – Ramnath 2 days ago — Ramnath, 2 days ago

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