PTARDIFF(1perl)

📦
version 5.44.0 · 2 versions
, in arch rolling

💖 PTARDIFF — bestie edition ✨

okay so real talk, this is ptardiff, section 1perl of the Perl Programmers Reference Guide. it's a whole little program and honestly? she's iconic. let me put you on.

🌸 NAME 🌸

ptardiff — a program that diffs an extracted archive against an unextracted one 🫶

🎀 DESCRIPTION 🎀

okay so ptardiff is a small program that diffs an extracted archive against an unextracted one, using the perl module Archive::Tar. no cap.

which effectively means it lets you view changes made to an archive's contents. like, you unpacked the thing, you poked at it, and now you wanna see what you actually did? bestie, that's the whole vibe. 💅

you hand the program an ARCHIVE_FILE and here's the little routine she runs:

  • she looks up all the files within the archive
  • she scans the current working directory for a file with that name
  • and she diffs it against the contents of the archive

that's it. that's the whole thing. lowkey genius, highkey simple. 🌈

✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

ptardiff ARCHIVE_FILE
ptardiff -h

okay bestie, watch the workflow, it's giving main character energy 🦋:

$ tar -xzf Acme-Buffy-1.3.tar.gz
$ vi Acme-Buffy-1.3/README
[...]
$ ptardiff Acme-Buffy-1.3.tar.gz > README.patch

see how that goes? extract, edit, diff, redirect into README.patch, slay. 👑

💅 OPTIONS 💅

  • h — prints this help message 🎀

🔥 SEE ALSO 🔥

tar(1), Archive::Tar.

that's the page, bestie. go forth and diff. no notes. 🍓

signing off with the vibe check: this page is from perl v5.44.0, dated 2026-10-17 — and yeah, it lives in the PTARDIFF(1perl) section of the Perl Programmers Reference Guide. periodt. ✨💖🦋

📦 where this page comes from