md5sum for directories?

[Gérard BIGOT]

On 8/16/06, Alexander Skwar <listen at alexander.skwar.name> wrote:
> · Gérard BIGOT <gerard.bigot at gmail.com>:
>
> > On 8/15/06, pkaplan1 at comcast.net <pkaplan1 at comcast.net> wrote:
> >> Is there something similar to md5sum for verifying that two copies of a directory are equivalent?
> >
> > Perhaps with :
> >
> > tar cvf  - dir_1| md5sum
> > tar cvf  - dir_2| md5sum
> >
> > and comparing the two strings?
>
> This will also take the ownership, permissions and times into
> consideration. With "md5sum $file", that's not done.
>
Yes, but he's asking for an 'equivalent' directories check. I don't
know what 'equivalent precisely means. I guess something between
identical and 'with the same content'. I tried to answer what he asked
for.

But, I like the diff -rq answer. Everything is a file...

Tschüss,
G.