Support rich binary diffs in snippets

Release notes

Support the ability to render a rich diff of the contents found inside a binary patch file contained in a snippet.

Problem to solve

Snippets are a convenient way to share patches with other users. If a patch contains plain text, the default syntax highlight is enough to easily interpret the patch. For example:

However, when examining binary patches, the results are not always ideal:

It would be nice, in the event that GitLab supports a compatible rich diff capability, that it could render a portion of the patch in some manner as visible in a commit diff:

Intended users

Designers and developers.

User experience goal

A user will be able to share a snippet with another user that contained a binary patch, and users viewing the snippet can view the proposed changes without needing to download the snippet and handle the patch comparison externally.

Proposal

A crude overview would be as follows:

• Detect that the snippet file is a .patch (diff) file.
• Examine the patch and look for specific file parts within the diff which can be rendered in a normal text format, a rich format or a default hex-view binary format (like the existing rendering).
• When rendering parts of the patch, for the rich content, display a respective view in a similar fashion which exists for commit diffs. Adding and removing (/dev/null), for example, an image would still render the content (with an indication that it is being added/removed).

Further details

• Provides an easy way to share technical data between users with increased usability which may not be easily shared/examined via other channels.

Permissions and Security

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Documentation

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Availability & Testing

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What does success look like, and how can we measure that?

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What is the type of buyer?

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Is this a cross-stage feature?

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Links / references

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