Support word wrap in the diff editor

[bpasero]

I cannot get word wrapping enabled in a diff editor when using that action but maybe there is no word wrapping for diff editors?

[alexdima]

Yes, word wrapping was never supported in diff editor -- has to do with aligning lines that wrap.

[bpasero]

Got it 👍

[vogler]

It would be nice if the diff editor also respected the word wrap setting.

Another related issue:
Both panes scroll in sync - but only to their content's width instead of the maximum of both panes.
So if I scroll on the left and come to a change where the right version is longer, I have to move the mouse to the right pane in order to be able to scroll to the end of the line.

[Fania]

I work on Latex projects with long paragraphs of text. Find and replace is almost unusable without word wrap. I can see how it wouldn't bother me much on my python projects maybe, but in Latex it's terrible.

[jakearchibald]

I'm a huge fan of vscode, but this is a blocker for me when it comes to using it for diffing.

[matt-cooper]

Is there some way to configure VS Code so that it launches an external Diff Tool instead (e.g. Araxis Merge) as a temporary workaround until this issue is fixed? (Even if I have to manually click a button to launch the the 3rd party diff tool.)

-edit-
I found a solution by adding this to my ~/.gitconfig file:

[mergetool "araxis"]
	path = /Applications/Araxis Merge.app/Contents/Utilities/compare
[diff]
    tool = araxis
[merge]
    tool = araxis

and then installed the "GitDiffer" VSCode extension and now when I right click a file in the Source Control tab of my VSCode window, the "Launch difftool for ..." context menu item will then launch Araxis Merge. Multiple selection doesn't work though (cannot select all changed files and load all of their diffs) but this is a good enough workaround for now.

[Dominik-K]

@alexandrudima If aligning lines is the blocker for this request, then the "flowing lines" diff view

mentioned in #25887 would solve this, right?

[protoEvangelion]

Are there any updates related to this issue?

[yaronyg]

I'm trying to diff MD files and the lack of word wrap support makes it pretty much impossible. :(

[kappanneo]

Same problem here, can't work on Latex diffs.

[pavelkouril]

Yes, this is a huge issue, makes it unuseable for a lot of diffing. :(

[pumpkinlink]

A good solution about aligning would be to break the line at any character, as opposed to breaking only between words, actually that is how I have my Vim setup, it is good for small screens. Example:

This (breaking always at exactly 80-char):

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Pellentesque suscipit r
isus quis pulvinar elementum. Aliquam faucibus nibh in turpis semper mollis. Nul
la euismod diam eu feugiat venenatis. Nullam quis ex vel mi condimentum maximus 
id id massa. Donec felis sem, porttitor at ligula eu, dapibus ultrices ante. Ali
quam quis accumsan arcu. Donec sollicitudin a ante id scelerisque. Aliquam eget 
lectus lectus. Quisque mattis, lectus non auctor auctor, nisi dui accumsan est, 
nec finibus ligula est nec est. Praesent scelerisque in sapien et consequat. Mae
cenas sollicitudin magna augue, quis ultrices urna pulvinar ut. Proin nisi turpi
s, fringilla eget diam eu, gravida iaculis tellus. Etiam et gravida nulla. Ut no
n faucibus lacus. Nulla facilisi.

Instead of this (breaking on last word separator before 80-char):

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Pellentesque suscipit 
risus quis pulvinar elementum. Aliquam faucibus nibh in turpis semper mollis. 
Nulla euismod diam eu feugiat venenatis. Nullam quis ex vel mi condimentum 
maximus id id massa. Donec felis sem, porttitor at ligula eu, dapibus ultrices 
ante. Aliquam quis accumsan arcu. Donec sollicitudin a ante id scelerisque. 
Aliquam eget lectus lectus. Quisque mattis, lectus non auctor auctor, nisi dui 
accumsan est, nec finibus ligula est nec est. Praesent scelerisque in sapien et 
consequat. Maecenas sollicitudin magna augue, quis ultrices urna pulvinar ut. 
Proin nisi turpis, fringilla eget diam eu, gravida iaculis tellus. Etiam et 
gravida nulla. Ut non faucibus lacus. Nulla facilisi.

[jakearchibald]

@pumpkinlink I wouldn't mind that as an option, but don't think it should be the default.

I like what Github's split view does https://github.com/w3c/ServiceWorker/pull/1229/files?diff=split.

[nikkifurls]

I would also like to know if there are any updates on this issue. Comparing files is very difficult at the moment due to the lack of word wrap in the Git diff view. Has anyone found any workarounds?

[michou]

@alexandrudima re:

Yes, word wrapping was never supported in diff editor -- has to do with aligning lines that wrap.

The thing is, it doesn't work with inline diffs, either. Don't know if that would be easier to implement, but I'd take this half-solution any time.

<backstory> I was SO thrilled to be able to review code inside VSCode only to stumble on a markdown file with lines long enough to send me back to the browser screaming 😱</backstory>

[FMuro]

I made a feature request for a word based diff on vscode, could it be an alternative to what people are asking in this post?

#103285

I don't see the relation.

[Nadano]

At least until word wrapping it done it should be possible to work with long lines if you can see the changes inline

[PeteX]

Word diff would be somewhat useful to me, but it's not as important as line wrapping. You get something approximating word diff anyway, because VSCode highlights the changed characters as well as the changed lines.

(The funny thing is that VSCode highlights changed characters but doesn't wrap lines. Atom wraps lines but doesn't highlight changed characters. When comparing documentation files with long lines, you just can't win!)

[frodal]

Instead of using an external diff tool with VSCode, the Rewrap extension can be used to break lines while looking at the diff with VSCode. The extension can be used to break lines at the cursor location by pressing Alt+Q. Rewrap also supports automatic wrapping (off by default) https://github.com/stkb/Rewrap/wiki/Auto-wrap. Rewrap requires no further settings to use. This behavior should be implemented in the diff editor of VSCode.

See also https://stackoverflow.com/questions/43122175/automatically-hard-wrap-lines-at-column-in-vscode/45883430

[SergeyMatsiupa]

Instead of using an external diff tool with VSCode, the Rewrap extension can be used to break lines while looking at the diff with VSCode.

@frodal sorry but looks like it doesn't work properly (for two in-memory documents at least):

[frodal]

@SergeyMatsiupa have you tried changing the settings of Rewrap, e.g., the wrapping column setting?
Here's an example with Latex, I guess it's not perfect.

[technic]

@frodal

This looks nice. Could you provide instructions how to get the wrapping work like on your second screenshot?

[frodal]

@technic see my previous post: #11387 (comment)

[floschl]

I think the initial intention of this feature request is rather to display the differences of a long line auto-wrapped in a multi-line, without making changes in the code, i.e. inserting new lines. The Rewrap extension seems to insert new lines!?

[pmattei]

I totally approve @floschl objection.
@frodal Thank for your workaround, but it cannot be used in many work situations.
For my example, we work on differents IDE (VScode/emacs/vim)
We already had a debate about the max line code length, with no concensus.
Just one rule, "please, do not commit to only modify code appearance, respect other coworkers work."
So it happend, that I have to review some lines with more than 300 characters.
With your workaround, I should rewrap all modified files before each review, and if I want to propose a diff, I should revert my modifications before. Not really efficient.
Other coworkers do not have this problem on emacs for example.

[gl4eqen]

I'm impressed that this issue just hangs in here for 4 years now.

[bknaepen]

I also would like this feature added...

[piersdeseilligny]

This issue also makes it impossible to diff fountain documents. Although this issue applies to any type of markup really, which means it isn't exactly an edge case or anything.

Why is something like this on the backlog? The original issue has got over 300 likes and was opened when vscode 1.4.0 was released - there's been 46 feature updates since. What other community support would be necessary for this to at least be looked at?

[pmattei]

Can't wait to see it :)

[AlexandreDecan]

Thank you!

[gjsjohnmurray]

@alexdima should this be working in Insiders now? I selected two files in Explorer, chose "Compare Selected", then tried to toggle word wrap from the View menu. It gave me an info notification"Cannot toggle word wrap in a diff editor."

Version: 1.52.0-insider (user setup)
Commit: 050a123
Date: 2020-11-12T05:43:04.852Z
Electron: 9.3.3
Chrome: 83.0.4103.122
Node.js: 12.14.1
V8: 8.3.110.13-electron.0
OS: Windows_NT x64 10.0.18363

[alexdima]

@gjsjohnmurray Yes, I've also seen that the toggle action in the View menu does not work yet. Setting word wrap via settings works for now. Let's track in #110468

[h-h-h-h]

It's finally working! 😲 🤩