What is the difference between binary diff and text diff?

Question

Data Comparison

Do I understand correctly that just for a text diff, a list of differences is generated, taking into account multibyte encodings?

Answer 1

A text diff is composed line by line and is intended to be able to merge two diffs together (conflicts in VCS). A binary diff simply conveys differences and is not meant to be merged.
“Accounting for multibyte encodings” - did not understand what you mean? It is needed to correctly determine line breaks in text diffs, and for "ignore whitespace" - that's about it.

Answer 2

Look at the table:
upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4f/ASCII_Code_Chart.svg
Binary diff = diff with red fields and text only with white fields. :-)