Compare files within folders between local computer and remote server

Question

I have one folder on my computer and one folder on a remote server, I transferred a large number of files but for some reason I have now 2 more files in my own folder than on the server so I would like to check which ones these are instead of going through them all manually. I looked for directory comparison and I found the command diff to display differences, but I tried it for my different two folders and it couldn't find the directory on the remote server. This is what I tried:

diff /Volumes/TC1-SIMDATA/Parallel/ModelWSSim/ fraukje@localhost:parallel/ModelWSSim/

Could anyone hint me what I am doing wrong here?

Answer 1

The diff command works only with file system accessible files and folders (i.e. mounted folders generally speaking).

If you can mount the folders, you'll be able to compare them with diff, else you need to invest some time to find a good diff merge tool with FTP or SFTP or whatever access protocol that you need.