diffutils: Unified Format
2.2.2 Unified Format
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The unified output format is a variation on the context format that is
more compact because it omits redundant context lines. To select this
output format, use the '--unified[=LINES]' ('-U LINES'), or '-u' option.
The argument LINES is the number of lines of context to show. When it
is not given, it defaults to three.
At present, only GNU 'diff' can produce this format and only GNU
'patch' can automatically apply diffs in this format. For proper
operation, 'patch' typically needs at least three lines of context.
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