HowTo: Compare binary files on Linux
Posted: Thu Aug 08, 2019 3:24 am
If you use "diff" to compare binary files (that have the same size), it will just tell you that:
Without the "-l" parameter, cmp will just tell you the first offset that differs.
With "-l" it will give you an output that looks somewhat like this:
According to cmp's manpage, it's "byte numbers and differing byte values".
The first column is the byte offset in decimal (CAUTION: starts at 1 not 0), but I haven't figured out yet what the values of column 2 or 3 mean. In my case here it's neither the value in each file, nor the difference, nor anything.
However: cmp is nice to see how many bytes at which offsets differ!
If you want to know the which bytes at which offsets differ, use the "cmp" command:Binary files A and B differ
Code: Select all
$ cmp -l a.bin b.binWith "-l" it will give you an output that looks somewhat like this:
Code: Select all
173 50 362
9067 63 67
9068 70 60
9069 65 62The first column is the byte offset in decimal (CAUTION: starts at 1 not 0), but I haven't figured out yet what the values of column 2 or 3 mean. In my case here it's neither the value in each file, nor the difference, nor anything.
However: cmp is nice to see how many bytes at which offsets differ!