bug in patch

[Abraham vd Merwe]

Hi!

patch doesn't handle files with spaces in the file names correctly. I've
attached a small test suite. If you do the following:

------------< snip <------< snip <------< snip <------------
$ tar zxf diff-test-suite.tar.gz
$ cd diff-test-suite/a
$ diff -Nru . ../c >& ../patch.diff
$ cd ..
$ cp -a a A
$ cd A
$ patch -p2 < ../patch.diff
------------< snip <------< snip <------< snip <------------

you will notice that patch completely screws up when patching the files with
spaces in them.

There's only one way you can solve this problem imho:

1) with the ---/+++ lines, you know it's

---<space><source-file><tab><date>\n
+++<space><dest-file><tab><date>\n

so if you strip ---<space> at the beginning and then the <tab><date> at the
end, you get the filename


By examining the diff -Nru part you can always get a screw up since you'll
have to compare the source file and dest file and see where it differs, but
you have spaces in the destination first-level directory, there's no way to
detect it.

I have no idea how you're going to detect it for non-unified diffs...

-- 

Regards
 Abraham

If I'd known computer science was going to be like this, I'd never have
given up being a rock 'n' roll star.
                -- G. Hirst

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 Abraham vd Merwe - 2d3D, Inc.

 Device Driver Development, Outsourcing, Embedded Systems

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diff-test-suite.tar.gz
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