How to list only file names that have changed between two branches

Question

I have two branches in my repository which I want to diff for some files.

I want to list only newly added migrations between those two branches.

Something like:

git diff branch1 branch2 | grep /db/migrate

How can I do it?

Answer 1

This command will diff their whole history:

git diff branch1..branch2 --name-only

If you want to compare from their last common ancestor, then:

git diff branch1...branch2 --name-only

And now you can grep files that you want. From there it's easy to write a little shell script that diffs two branches, file by file.

 filenames=$(git diff branch1...branch2 --name-only | grep /db/migratons)
 IFS=' '
 read -r -a filearr <<< "$filenames"
 for filename in "${filearr[@]}"
 do
      echo $(git diff branch1...branch2 -- "$filename")
 done

Create the git-command-name file and put it into the user/bin folder (you should parametrize input - branches as variables).

Git will recognise it as a command that you can call with:

git command-name branch1 branch2