bsdiff(1)

bsdiff1

Generate a patch between two binary files

Usage

bsdiff ⟨oldfile⟩ ⟨newfile⟩ ⟨patchfile⟩

Overview

bsdiff compares ⟨oldfile⟩ to ⟨newfile⟩ and writes to ⟨patchfile⟩ a binary patch suitable for use by bspatch(1). When ⟨oldfile⟩ and ⟨newfile⟩ are two versions of an executable program, the patches produced are on average a factor of five smaller than those produced by any other binary patch tool known to the author.

bsdiff uses memory equal to 17 times the size of ⟨oldfile⟩, and requires an absolute minimum working set size of 8 times the size of oldfile.

Releases

Unchanged in 10 releases since Debian 4.0 (Etch).

  1. 4.0–13

Authors

Colin Percival ⟨[email protected]⟩

From bsdiff 4.3-23 in Debian 13 (Trixie). Parsed by carta from the page's mdoc source.