A directory diff'ing script written using Unix magic piping files through `md5` to compare their contents.

diffdir

#!/bin/bash

# In honor of Dennis Ritchie, I present my directory diff'ing
# script built on the piping magic of Unix.
#
# Usage: diffdir dir1 dir2

set -e   # Bomb out of the script on any errors

diff_directories() {
  stream1=<(generate_manifest "$1")
  stream2=<(generate_manifest "$2")
  diff $stream1 $stream2 || echo ""
}

generate_manifest() {
  echo "manifest for $1"
  (cd "$1" && (find . -type f -exec /sbin/md5 {} \; | sort))
}

diff_directories "$1" "$2"