How to generate patch file for non-existing file

[memen45]

Hi all,

There is a missing file in some package that I use in a composer project, so I try to create a patch for it. Normally, one can obtain the .diff file from git diff path/to/file.xml > patch.diff. However, since I created a new file, there is no git diff to be created. I tried to use the following steps:

git add -N path/to/file.xml
git diff path/to/file.xml > patch.diff
git reset --mixed

It seems to generate a valid .diff file, but after composer update, the patch does not seem to be applied. Is this expected behaviour and if so, is it possible to add a new file through a patch like this?

Thanks in advance!

[cweagans]

When you git add, you've added the changes to git's staging area. When you git diff, it only shows the differences for the files that are outside the staging area. If you only have that one file that you want to include in a patch, you can git diff --cached path/to/file.xml > patch.diff to generate a patch from the staging area changes.

[memen45]

Your solution also seems to work, with a diff file that is similar to the one I got. However, when doing a composer require <vendor>/<package> and showing "Applying patches for vendor/package", the missing file is not added to the correct folder.

I do find the file in vendor/<vendor>/<package>/vendor/<vendor>/<package>/.... Caused by me using the composer working directory instead of the // as working directory for the git diff command... 😮‍💨

Solved it by modifying the diff file and removing the vendor/<vendor>/<package> from the file paths. For future reference, run the git diff command from the package directory, not the root composer directory...

Thanks for your help!