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Could somebody explain me the difference between a .diff file and .patch file.
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diff works by cataloging the changes between the two files or folders. Patch can take those changes, put them in a file, and update older versions with it.
A DIFF file is a single file showing the differences between one or more text or source files. It is created by Mercurial, a control management tool for developers to obtain differences between files and apply the patches.
There are no differences.
The patch file (also called a patch for short) is a text file that consists of a list of differences and is produced by running the related diff program with the original and updated file as arguments. Updating files with patch is often referred to as applying the patch or simply patching the files.
What matters is the content of the file, not the extension. Both of those extensions imply that some sort of diff utility (diff, git diff, git format-patch, svn diff) produced the output.
Many diff utilities produce output which can be applied by the patch command. You will frequently need to use the -d and -p options to patch in order to get the paths matched up right (strip prefix, name target directory). If you see one of those extensions on a file distributed online, it's almost certainly an indication it's compatible with patch.
Git's diff output is compatible with patch, but I believe svn's is not. Of course, plain patches generated by git diff are probably best applied by git apply, and patches generated by git format-patch are designed for use with git-am.
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There are no differences. diff utility produces a patch file which is applied using patch.
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