Colored diff on the Command line

If you wanted your diff output to be colored you have three options

1. Use a verison control program that outputs colored diff output

   git diff --color=always old-file new-file | less -R
   

   note:	Mercurial does not allow you to run its hg diff outside of a repository

2. Use a text editor that allows for syntax highlighing of diff output.

   diff old-file new-file | vim -R -
   
   diff old-file new-file | joe -rdonly -
   

   note:	When using joe you may have to manually set the syntax highlighting with ^T Y diff [return]

3. Use a wrapper for diff called colordiff

   colordiff old-file new-file
   diff old-file new-file | colordiff
   

   note:	that colordiff is just a wrapper and thus does not paginate adding a pipe to less -R would solve that issue