Command-line options --auto

[Finkielsztein, Marcelo]

Hello,

First of all congratulations for your excellent tool!

My comment:  maybe I misunderstand the documentation.
I see this:
Options:
  -m, --merge               Merge the input.
  -b, --base file           Explicit base file. For compatibility with certain tools.
  -o, --output file         Output file. Implies -m. E.g.: -o newfile.txt
  --out file                Output file, again. (For compatibility with certain tools.)
  --auto                    No GUI if all conflicts are auto-solvable. (Needs -o file)
  --qall                    Don't solve conflicts automatically. (For compatibility...)
  --L1 alias1               Visible name replacement for input file 1 (base).
  --L2 alias2               Visible name replacement for input file 2.
  --L3 alias3               Visible name replacement for input file 3.
  -L, --fname alias         Alternative visible name replacement. Supply this once for every input.
  --cs string               Override a config setting. Use once for every setting. E.g.: --cs "AutoAdvance=1"
  --confighelp              Show list of config settings and current values.
  --config file             Use a different config file.



And I understand that there will not be any interactive window popping up if I use --auto.

Nevertheless, I have two identical files: file1.txt and file2.txt.  I issue this command:
Kdifff3 file1.txt fil2.txt -o kdiff_results.txt --auto
And I still see a GUI message window popping up, telling there are zero conflicts to resolve and file are identical.
Screenshot attached

It is true that the kdiff GUI program does not show, but I still have to "click" on the [OK] button to close the popup.

I had expected the program to run, output results to my -o file, and set the ERRORLEVEL to 1 when there are differences, or set it to 0 when files are identical; with no interactivity needed at all.

Maybe, this is the intended behaviour and I suppose I misunderstood the intention of the --auto option.

In that case, I would to suggest another option, to obtain the behaviour I have described:  when no diff, do not even pop up a message, just set the errorlevel and go on.
(in the meantime I am using the DOS built-in "fc" utility for this, but ... I wanted to use kdiff to compare and go on when "all good" and to pop up a window only when diffs are found.  Simpler that combining both tools.)

Alternatively, I expected the output file to be empty when both files are identical.

Hope this makes sense.

Thank you for KDIFF3.  It is wonderful!
Marcelo
--
MARCELO FINKIELSZTEIN
DATA WAREHOUSE SPECIALIST
Postmedia Business Technology, a division of Postmedia Network Inc.
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