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<html><head><title>Merging And The Merge Output Editor Window</title><link rel="stylesheet" href="help:/common/kde-default.css" type="text/css"><meta name="generator" content="DocBook XSL Stylesheets V1.67.2"><meta name="keywords" content="KDE, kdeextragear, kdiff3, diff, merge, CVS, triplediff, compare, files, directories, version control, three-way-merge, in-line-differences, synchronise, kpart, kio, networktransparent, editor, white space, comments"><link rel="start" href="index.html" title="The KDiff3 Handbook"><link rel="up" href="documentation.html" title="Chapter 2. File Comparison And Merge"><link rel="prev" href="interpretinginformation.html" title="Comparing Files And Interpreting The Information In The Input Windows"><link rel="next" href="navigation.html" title="Navigation And Editing"><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8"><meta name="GENERATOR" content="KDE XSL Stylesheet V1.13 using libxslt"></head><body bgcolor="white" text="black" link="#0000FF" vlink="#840084" alink="#0000FF"><div style="background-image: url(help:/common/top-middle.png); width: 100%; height: 131px;"><div style="position: absolute; right: 0px;"><img src="help:/common/top-right-konqueror.png" style="margin: 0px" alt=""></div><div style="position: absolute; top: 25px; right: 100px; text-align: right; font-size: xx-large; font-weight: bold; text-shadow: #fff 0px 0px 5px; color: #444">Merging And The Merge Output Editor Window</div></div><div style="margin-top: 20px; background-color: #white; color: black; margin-left: 20px; margin-right: 20px;"><div style="position: absolute; left: 20px;"><a accesskey="p" href="interpretinginformation.html">Prev</a></div><div style="position: absolute; right: 20px;"><a accesskey="n" href="navigation.html">Next</a></div><div class="navCenter">File Comparison And Merge</div></div><div class="sect1" lang="en"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="merging"></a>Merging And The Merge Output Editor Window</h2></div></div></div><div class="screenshot"><div xmlns:doc="http://nwalsh.com/xsl/documentation/1.0" class="mediaobject"><hr><img src="screenshot_merge.png"><hr></div></div><p>
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The merge output editor window (below the diff input windows) also has an info line at the top showing "Output:", the
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filename and "[Modified]" if you edited something. Usually it will contain
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some text through the automatic merge facilities, but often it will also
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contain conflicts.
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</p><p>
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!!! Saving is disabled until all conflicts are resolved !!! (Use the "Go
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to prev/next unsolved conflicts"-buttons to find the remaining conflicts.)
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</p><p>
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With only two input files every difference is also a conflict that must
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be solved manually.
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</p><p>
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With three input files the first file is treated as base, while the
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second and third input files contain modifications. When at any line only
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either input B or input C have changed but not both then the changed source
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will automatically be selected. Only when B and C have changed on the same
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lines, then the tool detects a conflict that must be solved manually.
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When B and C are the same, but not the same as A, then C is selected.
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</p><div class="sect2" lang="en"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h3 class="title"><a name="id2564630"></a>The Summary Column</h3></div></div></div><p>
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The merge output editor window also has a summary column on the left. It shows the
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letter of the input from which a line was selected or nothing if all three
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sources where equal on a line. For conflicts it shows a questionmark "?"
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and the line shows "<Merge Conflict>", all in red. Because solving
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conflicts line by line would take very long, the lines are grouped into
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groups that have the same difference and conflict characteristics.
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But only-white-space-conflicts are separated from non-white-space-conflicts
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in order to ease the merging of files were the indentation changed for many
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lines.
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</p></div><div class="sect2" lang="en"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h3 class="title"><a name="synchronise_views"></a>Setting The Current Group And Synchronising Merge And Diff View Position</h3></div></div></div><p>
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When clicking into the summary column with the left mouse button in either
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window then the beginning of the group belonging to that line will shown in all windows.
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This group then becomes the "current group". It is highlighted with the
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"Current range (diff) background color" and
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a black bar appears on the left side of the text.
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</p></div><div class="sect2" lang="en"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h3 class="title"><a name="id2564684"></a>Choosing Inputs A, B or C For Current Conflict And Editing</h3></div></div></div><p>
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The button bar below the menubar contains three input selector buttons
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containing the letters "A", "B" and "C". Click the input selector
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button to insert (or remove if already inserted) the lines from the respective source.
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To choose the lines from several inputs click the respective buttons in the
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needed order. For example if you want that the lines from "B" appear before
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the lines from "A" in the output, first click "B", then "A".
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</p><p>
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If you use the auto-advance option
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(<a href="navigation.html#autoadvance" title="Auto-Advance">"Automatically go to next unsolved conflict after source selection"</a>),
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you should disable this before choosing lines from several inputs or if you want to
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edit the lines after your choice. Otherwise <span class="application">KDiff3</span> will jump to the next
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conflict after choosing the first input.
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</p><p>
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It is often helpful directly edit the merge output.
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The summary column will show "m" for every line that was manually modified.
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When for instance the differences are aligned in a way that simply choosing
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the inputs won't be satisfactory, then you can mark the needed text and use
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normal <a href="selections.html" title="Select, Copy And Paste">copy and paste</a> to put it into the merge output.
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</p><p>
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Sometimes, when a line is removed either by automatic merge or by editing
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and no other lines remain in that group, then the text <No src line>
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will appear in that line. This is just a placeholder for the group for
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when you might change your mind and select some source again. This text won't
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appear in the saved file or in any selections you want to copy and paste.
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</p><p>
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The text "<Merge Conflict>" will appear in the clipboard if you
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copy and paste some text containing such a line. But still be careful to
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do so.
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</p></div><div class="sect2" lang="en"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h3 class="title"><a name="id2564761"></a>Choosing Input A, B, or C for All Conflicts</h3></div></div></div><p>
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The normal merge will start by solving simple conflicts automatically.
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But the "Merge"-menu provides some actions for other common needs.
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If you have to select the same source for most conflicts, then you can
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choose "A", "B" or "C" everywhere, or only for the remaining unsolved
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conflicts, or for unsolved white space conflicts. If you want to decide every
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single delta yourself, you can "Set deltas to conflicts". Or if you want to
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return to the automatic choices of <span class="application">KDiff3</span> then select
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"Automatically solve simple conflicts". <span class="application">KDiff3</span> then restarts the merge.
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For actions that change your previous modifications <span class="application">KDiff3</span> will ask for your
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confirmation before proceeding.
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</p><p>
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Note: When choosing either source for unsolved white space conflicts and
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the options "Ignore Numbers" or "Ignore C/C++ Comments" are used then changes in
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numbers or comments will be treated like white space too.
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</p></div><div class="sect2" lang="en"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h3 class="title"><a name="vcskeywordsmergesupport"></a>Automatic Merge of Version Control Keywords and History (Log)</h3></div></div></div><p>
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Many version control systems support special keywords in the file. (e.g. "$Date$",
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"$Header$", "$Author$", "$Log$" etc.) During the
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check-in the version control system (VCS) changes these lines. For instance
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"$Date$" will turn into "$Date: 2005/03/22 18:45:01 $". Since this line will
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be different in every version of the file, it would require manual interaction
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during the merge.
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</p><p>
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<span class="application">KDiff3</span> offers automatic merge for these items. For simple lines that match the
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"Auto merge regular expression"-option in all input-files <span class="application">KDiff3</span> will choose
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the line from B or - if available - from C. (Additionally it is necessary that the lines
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in question line up in the comparison and the previous line contains no conflict.)
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This auto merge can either be run immediately after a merge starts (activate the option
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"Run regular expression auto merge on merge start") or later via the merge
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menu "Run Regular Expression Auto Merge".
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</p><p>
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Automatic merge for version control history (also called "log") is also supported.
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The history automerge can either run immediately when the merge starts by activating the
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option "Merge version control history on merge start" or later via the merge menu
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"Automatically Solve History Conflicts".
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</p><p>
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Usually the version control history begins with a line containing the keyword "$Log$".
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This must be matched by the "History start regular expression"-option.
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<span class="application">KDiff3</span> detects which subsequent lines are in the history by analysing the leading characters
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that came before the "$Log$"-keyword. If the same "leading comment"-characters also appears in the following
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lines, then they are also included in the history.
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</p><p>
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During each check-in the VCS writes a unique line specifying version-, date- and time-information
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followed by lines with user comments.
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These lines form one history-entry. This history section grows with every check-in and the
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most recent entries appear at the top (after the history start line).
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</p><p>
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When for parallel development two or more developers check-in a branch of the file then
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the merge history will contain several entries that appear as conflicts during the merge
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of the branches. Since merging these can become very tedious, <span class="application">KDiff3</span> offers support with two
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possible strategies: Just insert the history information from both contributors at the top
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or sort the history information by a user defined key.
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</p><p>
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The just-insert-all-entries-method is easier to configure. <span class="application">KDiff3</span> just needs a method to
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detect, which lines belong to one history entry. Most VCS insert an empty line after each
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history entry. If there are no other empty lines, this is a sufficient criterion for <span class="application">KDiff3</span>.
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Just set an empty "History entry start regular expression". If the empty line criterion
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isn't sufficient, you can specify a regular expression to detect the history entry start.
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</p><p>
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Note that <span class="application">KDiff3</span> will remove duplicate history entrys. If a history entry appeared several times
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in the history of a input file, only one entry will remain in the output.
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</p><p>
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If you want to sort the history, then you have to specify how the sort key should be built.
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Use parentheses in the "History entry start regular expression" to group parts of the regular
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expression that should later be used for the sort key.
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Then specify the "History entry start sort key order" specifying a comma "," separated list of
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numbers referring to the position of the group in the regular expression.
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</p><p>
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Because this is not so easy to get right immediately, you are able to test and improve
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the regular expressions and key-generation in a dedicated dialog by pressing the
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"Test your regular expressions"-button.
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</p><p>Example: Assume a history that looks like this:
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<pre class="screen">
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/**************************************************************************
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** HISTORY: $Log: \toms_merge_main_view\MyApplication\src\complexalgorithm.cpp $
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**
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** \main\integration_branch_12 2 Apr 2001 10:45:41 tom
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** Merged branch simon_branch_15.
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**
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** \main\henry_bugfix_branch_7\1 30 Mar 2001 19:22:05 henry
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** Improved the speed for subroutine convertToMesh().
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** Fixed crash.
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**************************************************************************/
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</pre>
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The history start line matches the regular expression ".*\$Log.*\$.*". Then follow
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the history entries.
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</p><p>
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The line with the "$Log$"-keyword begins with two "*" after which follows a space.
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<span class="application">KDiff3</span> uses the first non-white-space string as "leading comment" and assumes that
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the history ends in the first line without this leading comment. In this example the
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last line ends with a string that also starts with two "*", but instead of a space
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character more "*" follow. Hence this line ends the history.
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</p><p>
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If history sorting isn't required then the history entry start line regular expression
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could look like this. (This line is split in two because it wouldn't fit otherwise.)
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<pre class="screen">
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\s*\\main\\\S+\s+[0-9]+ (Jan|Feb|Mar|Apr|May|Jun|Jul|Aug|Sep|Oct|Nov|Dec)
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[0-9][0-9][0-9][0-9] [0-9][0-9]:[0-9][0-9]:[0-9][0-9]\s+.*
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</pre>
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For details about regular expressions please see the
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<a href="http://doc.trolltech.com/3.3/qregexp.html#details" target="_top">regular expression documentation by Trolltech</a>.
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Note that "\s" (with lowercase "s") matches any white space and "\S" (with uppercase "S") matches any non-white-space.
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In our example the history entry start contains first the version info with reg. exp. "\\main\\\S+", the date consisting of day "[0-9]+", month "(Jan|Feb|Mar|Apr|May|Jun|Jul|Aug|Sep|Oct|Nov|Dec)" and year "[0-9][0-9][0-9][0-9]", the time "[0-9][0-9]:[0-9][0-9]:[0-9][0-9]" and finally the developers login name ".*".
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</p><p>
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Note that the "leading comment"-characters (in the example "**") will already be removed by <span class="application">KDiff3</span>
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before trying to match, hence the regular expression begins with a match for none or more white-space characters "\s*".
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Because comment characters can differ in each file (e.g. C/C++ uses other comment characters than a Perl script)
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<span class="application">KDiff3</span> takes care of the leading comment characters and you should not specify them in the regular expression.
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</p><p>
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If you require a sorted history. Then the sortkey must be calculated. For this the
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relevant parts in the regular expression must be grouped by parentheses.
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(The extra parentheses can also stay in if history sorting is disabled.)
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<pre class="screen">
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\s*\\main\\(\S+)\s+([0-9]+) (Jan|Feb|Mar|Apr|May|Jun|Jul|Aug|Sep|Oct|Nov|Dec)
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([0-9][0-9][0-9][0-9]) ([0-9][0-9]:[0-9][0-9]:[0-9][0-9])\s+(.*)
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</pre>
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The parentheses now contain 1. version info, 2. day, 3. month, 4. year, 5. time, 6. name.
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But if we want to sort by date and time, we need to construct a key with the elements in a different order of appearance:
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First the year, followed by month, day, time, version info and name. Hence the sortkey order to specify is "4,3,2,5,1,6".
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</p><p>
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Because month names aren't good for sorting ("Apr" would be first) <span class="application">KDiff3</span> detects in which order
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the month names were given and uses that number instead ("Apr"->"04").
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And if a pure number is found it will be transformed to a 4-digit value with leading zeros for sorting.
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Finally the resulting sort key for the first history entry start line will be:
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<pre class="screen">
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2001 04 0002 10:45:41 integration_branch_12 tom
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</pre>
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</p><p>
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For more information also see <a href="options.html#mergeoptions" title="Merge Settings">Merge Settings</a>.
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