The Git Diff Tool
Return the diff of the working tree or between refs so an agent — and you — can review precisely what changed before it’s committed, reviewed, or merged.
A suggestion isn’t a shipped change
An agent that can only propose code still leaves all the work to a human. To actually deliver, it needs a real, governed workspace where it can run code, edit files, test, and use Git — safely, and without touching anything you didn’t allow.
Read-only agents
Suggestions still require a human to run, test, and commit everything.
Unsafe execution
Running agent-generated code on real infrastructure is a security risk.
No verification
Without tests and builds, an agent can’t know its change works.
Ungoverned Git
Direct repo access with no policy or audit is a non-starter in the enterprise.
Git Diff, without the risk
Capability
What it does
Show exactly what an agent changed.
it returns the Git diff for the working tree or between two references.
Assignable to any agent
How it works
Predictable, inspectable behavior
Designed to be reliable.
it produces a standard unified diff from the workspace repo, so changes are reviewable by a human or another tool before anything is committed.
Every call logged
Governance
Private, governed, on-premise
Runs inside your perimeter.
Execution runs in an isolated, on-premise sandbox scoped per tenant with full command and file audit logging, so an agent can do real work on your code without unsafe access or anything leaving your perimeter.
Per-tenant, logged
Parameters
The git_diff tool accepts these inputs when an agent calls it. Required inputs are flagged.
default: . Optional Repository directory.
default: false Optional Diff staged changes instead of the working tree.
How the Git Diff tool works in practice
Git Diff is a code execution & workspace tool you assign to a VDF AI agent. It returns the Git diff for the working tree or between two references. Its hallmarks — Diff, Unified, Reviewable — let an agent rely on it as a dependable step in a larger task rather than a brittle one-off script.
Under the hood, it produces a standard unified diff from the workspace repo, so changes are reviewable by a human or another tool before anything is committed. Every call is scoped to the requesting tenant and written to an audit log, so the capability is safe to run inside a regulated, on-premise environment — the same governance model behind every VDF AI tool.
Teams reach for Git Diff when they need to handle change review, PR bodies, and self-review. It rarely works alone — pair it with Git Status, Git Commit, and File Patch to build a complete, governed workflow, then compose those steps into an on-premise VDF AI Network.
Where Git Diff pays back
Change review
Inspect exactly what an agent edited.
PR bodies
Summarize a diff into a pull-request description.
Self-review
Let an agent critique its own diff before committing.
Auditing
Capture the precise change for the record.
Assigned to agents, orchestrated as networks
On VDF AI, an industry’s use cases map to agents, and you assign tools like this one to those agents. Compose multiple agents into a governed, on-premise network.
What changes after you assign it
Questions about the Git Diff tool
What is the Git Diff tool?
It returns the Git diff for the working tree or between two references. Assigned to a VDF AI agent, it runs under role-based policy with full audit logging so the capability is safe to use in production.
Can it diff against a branch?
Yes. Provide a base ref to diff the current state against a branch or commit.
Does it show staged changes?
Set staged to true to diff what’s staged rather than the working tree.
What inputs does the Git Diff tool need?
It has no strictly required inputs, and optionally accepts path, base, and staged. Each parameter is validated when an agent calls the tool, and the full call is logged for audit.
Which tools pair well with Git Diff?
Git Diff is commonly assigned alongside Git Status, Git Commit, and File Patch. On VDF AI you compose several tools and agents into a single governed, on-premise network.
Does it run on-premise?
Yes. Like every VDF AI tool, it can run on-premise or in your sovereign cloud, scoped per user and audit-logged, so your data never leaves your perimeter.
How do agents use it?
You assign the tool to an agent under a role-based policy; the agent calls it as one step in a task, and several agents and tools can be orchestrated together as a governed VDF AI Network.
Assign Git Diff to these agents
These VDF AI agents can be assigned this tool. Open an agent to see the full toolkit it can run.
Tools that work well alongside this one
Where this tool delivers value
Put Git Diff to work
See the Git Diff tool assigned to an agent and orchestrated in a governed, on-premise network.