Feature request: Diff directories (not git rev)

[Makaze]

Situation: Have two folders, e.g., two worktrees.

Desired behavior: :DiffView path1/ path2/ (or equiv) and DiffView behaves as expected relative to the folders instead of the git rev.

If this is already possible, please add this as a use case to the docs! It's powerful agnostic of the versioning tools used.

[Kailian-Jacy]

Currently it seems diffing non-git files are not supported. Either git or hg adapter needs to be selected.

diffview.nvim/lua/diffview/lib.lua

Lines 19 to 39 in 4516612

	function M.diffview_open(args)
	local default_args = config.get_config().default_args.DiffviewOpen
	local argo = arg_parser.parse(utils.flatten({ default_args, args }))
	local rev_arg = argo.args[1]
	logger:info("[command call] :DiffviewOpen " .. table.concat(utils.flatten({
	default_args,
	args,
	}), " "))
	local err, adapter = vcs.get_adapter({
	cmd_ctx = {
	path_args = argo.post_args,
	cpath = argo:get_flag("C", { no_empty = true, expand = true }),
	},
	})
	if err then
	utils.err(err)
	return
	end

Also advocating for this function.

The name diffview.nvim sounds like a general diffing view as alternative and enhancement to nvim diff, but without this functionality it seems more like gitdiff.nvim, vcsdiff.nvim or something.

I haven't read code carefully, but on skip reading It seems like diffview.nvim is diffing manually but not relying on something like git diff. So hopefully it will be convenient to extend diffview to general files not being tracked by git?

diffview.nvim/lua/diffview/diff.lua

Lines 100 to 130 in 4516612

	function Diff:lcs(astart, aend, bstart, bend)
	-- separate common head
	while astart < aend and bstart < bend and self.eql_fn(self.a[astart], self.b[bstart]) do
	astart = astart + 1
	bstart = bstart + 1
	end
	-- separate common tail
	while astart < aend and bstart < bend and self.eql_fn(self.a[aend - 1], self.b[bend - 1]) do
	aend = aend - 1
	bend = bend - 1
	end
	if astart == aend then
	-- only insertions
	while bstart < bend do
	self.modb[bstart] = true
	bstart = bstart + 1
	end
	elseif bend == bstart then
	-- only deletions
	while astart < aend do
	self.moda[astart] = true
	astart = astart + 1
	end
	else
	local snake = self:snake(astart, aend, bstart, bend)
	self:lcs(astart, snake.x, bstart, snake.y)
	self:lcs(snake.u, aend, snake.v, bend)
	end
	end

[bew]

It could be using git diff --no-index path1 path2 which works well for any paths (file, dir, that is inside or outside a repo)

I'm assuming here (but am not sure at all) that diffview integrates with the output of git diff 🤔

[Kailian-Jacy]

It could be using git diff --no-index path1 path2 which works well for any paths

Does diffview have support for this?
POSIX diff can do this too I'm afraid. But we need an integration into nvim tui.