App recommendation for text diff on iOS

I sometimes need to diff two plain text files on iOS. (They would both be in Dropbox.) Can anyone recommend an iOS app for this purpose?

The only one I found is Kaleidoscope 2, which looks great but is a little too expensive for my very occasional usage.

Background (in case you’re interested): I use Ulysses for writing. Instead of keeping my files in Ulysses’s native iCloud database, I keep them as plain text files in Dropbox folders as this allows me to work on them in others apps and devices. Occasionally, there are conflicts and Ulysses and/or Dropbox creates an extra file to prevent data destruction. I need a diff app to reconcile the files. I’m fine with this “problem” as it only happens once a month, if that. I’m not asking for a different writing workflow.

The Pro version of TextKraft ($5.99) claims “Comparison function for text documents and other files”. Never used it though.

Ulysses offers split view, but not a view showing differences between files.

Much easier on the Mac. Even the free version of BBEdit can do this well. (From what I remember, if you had xCode installed you could use FileMerge. And there are specialized apps like VisualDiffer.)

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I’ll take a look at TextKraft, thanks for the suggestion. On the Mac there are abundant options, both free and paid. Alas, the pickings are slimmer on iOS.

You could use Working Copy to do this as well.

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I didn’t know that. Thank you for the suggestion! I figure that I’d need the full version of Working Copy, though, which is quite a high price to pay for diffing :slight_smile:

Not sure how script savvy you are, but… I’d built a diff action in Drafts, using Javascript. That probably won’t suit your workflow (the action compares the currently active draft with a version selected from that draft’s history). But that gets me thinking that you might be able to put something together in Scriptable, if someone hasn’t done so already?

With that in mind, you might also be able to make something happen relatively easily with 1Writer, which would probably be a better fit your workflow? Come to think of it, I also had a diff action in Editorial for pretty much the same reason you’ve cited (Dropbox duplicates), which still works, although Editorial hasn’t been updated for a couple of years now…

Does it really require the full version? I thought most of the basic git functions (including showing the changes from one commit to another) are available for free.