tmeld 0.4.0

Meld, in your terminal: a faithful TUI port of the Meld diff/merge tool

tmeld — Meld, in your terminal

A faithful terminal port of GNOME Meld: the same diff engine (vendored verbatim), the same colors, the same keybindings — over plain SSH. Two- and three-way file comparison and merging, folder comparison, and a version-control view.

tmeld a.py b.py                  # 2-way compare/edit
tmeld local.py base.py remote.py # 3-way merge (middle = merged file)
tmeld dirA dirB                  # folder comparison (Enter opens files)
tmeld .                          # version-control view (git, hg, svn, ...)
tmeld a b --diff c d --diff x y  # extra comparison tabs (like meld --diff)
tmeld --theme meld-dark a b      # Meld's dark scheme

Keys (Meld's own)

Action	Keys
Next / previous change	Alt+Down, Ctrl+D / Alt+Up, Ctrl+E
Push chunk left / right	Alt+Left / Alt+Right
Pull chunk from left / right	Alt+Shift+Right / Alt+Shift+Left
Copy chunk above / below	Alt+[ Alt+] / Alt+; Alt+'
Delete chunk	Alt+Delete
Next / previous conflict (3-way)	Ctrl+K / Ctrl+J
Merge all non-conflicting (3-way)	Alt+M
Save	Ctrl+S
Next / previous pane	Alt+PgDn / Alt+PgUp
Close tab	Ctrl+W (twice if unsaved)
Next / previous tab	Ctrl+Alt+PgDn / Ctrl+Alt+PgUp
Quit	Ctrl+Q

Gutter arrows between panes are clickable (they push the chunk); the right-edge map is click-to-jump. On macOS terminals, set "Option as Esc+" (iTerm2: Profiles → Keys) so Alt bindings arrive.

In folder comparisons: Enter compares the file under the cursor (or expands/collapses a folder), Alt+Left/Right copy the row to that neighbor pane, Delete deletes it (press twice to confirm), Alt+Down/Up jump between differing rows, and Alt+PgDn/PgUp move the focused pane (the column copy/delete act on). Meld's default filename filters (backups, VCS metadata, binaries, OS cruft) apply.

In the version-control view (tmeld . anywhere in a working copy): Enter compares a changed file against the repository (repo side read-only); a conflicted file opens as a remote/merge/local 3-way whose middle-pane saves resolve the working file. c commits (Meld's Ctrl+M IS Enter in a terminal, so the mnemonic moved), r reverts, Delete deletes, Ctrl+R/F5 rescans.

Pixel linkmap (Tier 2)

On terminals with graphics support, the gutter between panes widens and Meld's anti-aliased connector curves are drawn there as real pixels — kitty graphics protocol (kitty, WezTerm, Ghostty) or sixel (iTerm2, recent VTE), auto-detected at startup. --graphics none|sixel|kitty overrides the probe. Everything else stays cell-based; without graphics you keep the compact 3-column gutter.

git mergetool

tmeld follows Meld's convention: tmeld $LOCAL $MERGED $REMOTE, the middle pane is the merged file. The exit code is 0 only if the middle pane was saved, so git can trust it:

[merge]
    tool = tmeld
[mergetool "tmeld"]
    cmd = tmeld "$LOCAL" "$MERGED" "$REMOTE"
    trustExitCode = true

tmeld -o OUTPUT local base remote redirects middle-pane saves to OUTPUT (like meld -o) if you'd rather keep the base file untouched.

For diffs: git difftool -x tmeld or

[diff]
    tool = tmeld
[difftool "tmeld"]
    cmd = tmeld "$LOCAL" "$REMOTE"

License and provenance

GPL-2.0-or-later (see LICENSE), like Meld — whose engine this project vendors byte-for-byte apart from mechanical import rewrites (tmeld/_vendor/meld/, pinned commit recorded in tmeld/_vendor/UPSTREAM, rewrites applied by maint/vendor.py). The vendored vc/ package is BSD 2-clause (its COPYING ships alongside).

tmeld is an independent project, not affiliated with or endorsed by the Meld or GNOME projects. All credit for the diff engine and the design this port imitates goes to Meld and its maintainers.