Styjun

In the PR interface on GitHub, I can see the new changes that I've made to my branch as a diff against the master branch.

I'd like to get a list of these files from the command line.

An issue arises (on the command line) when a file was deleted on the target branch I'm diffing against (e.g. master) but my branch isn't aware of this change.

1. Create git repo and add file a to master.


2. Create branch add-b from master and add a file b. Don't merge.


3. Switch back to master and remove a. Commit.


4. Switch back to branch add-b and run git diff --name-only --diff-filter=A master, which shows both a and b as having been added.

Given that git checkout master && git merge add-b will not re-add the file a to the repo, I understand there must be some mechanism whereby git figures this out and imagine there is a way to bubble up this information.

What command(s) must I run to only show added / modified files, and avoid ones that have been deleted on the target branch?

Edit - example for clarity

• ~/src/git-testing $$$ git init
Initialized empty Git repository in /Users/ryan.tuck/src/git-testing/.git/
• ~/src/git-testing $$$ touch a && git add . && git commit -m 'add a'
[master (root-commit) f65661b] add a
 1 file changed, 0 insertions(+), 0 deletions(-)
 create mode 100644 a
• ~/src/git-testing $$$ git checkout -b add-b
Switched to a new branch 'add-b'
• ~/src/git-testing $$$ touch b
• ~/src/git-testing $$$ git add . && git commit -m 'add b'
[add-b 588960f] add b
 1 file changed, 0 insertions(+), 0 deletions(-)
 create mode 100644 b
• ~/src/git-testing $$$ ls
a b
• ~/src/git-testing $$$ git checkout master
Switched to branch 'master'
• ~/src/git-testing $$$ ls
a
• ~/src/git-testing $$$ rm a && git add . && git commit -m 'remove a'
[master 2b4d9f8] remove a
 1 file changed, 0 insertions(+), 0 deletions(-)
 delete mode 100644 a
• ~/src/git-testing $$$ ls
• ~/src/git-testing $$$ git checkout add-b
Switched to branch 'add-b'
• ~/src/git-testing $$$ git diff --name-only --diff-filter=A master
a
b

I think there's no magic in what you are asking there. master has no files, and add-b has both a and b.... so both files have to be added for the diff to make sense..... are you struggling because you think that git is somehow considering the history of a and b (files) when comparing the branches? I don't think that is the case.... not on this example, anyway. Perhaps you would like to use something more like the diff since both branches diverged? If that's the case, try with ...:

git diff master...add-b

That should show you only the addition of b.