I run the following diff command on two files diff -c cut.txt names.txt Below is the output I get. The ! means that the text cannot be modified because of permissions. *** cut.txt 2020-12-10 11:16:27.985767787 -0500 - names.txt 2020-12-10 10:57:52.788152885 -0500 ** 1,4 **** ! hello&world I scott&shaper ! james&john ! phone&number *** 1,3--- ! zeb zebra ! amy adams ! jamie adams True False