1. Tools To Compare Documents
2. Document Comparison Software

This article compares computer software tools that compare files, and in many cases directories or folders, whether it is their main purpose or as part of more general file management.

DocMoto for Mac review: Network-based document management tool tracks it all. Allows you to compare different versions of the documents to see what changes have been made. DocMoto is a.

• Kaleidoscope is the world’s most powerful file comparison app. Compare different text files, images, and folders on your Mac and iPad. Review and merge changes in a matter of seconds (merging available only on the Mac).
• A folder comparison report can, optionally, include file comparison reports for some or all of the files involved in the folder comparison. Thus it is possible to generate a report that is a complete record of all the differences in all of the files involved in a folder comparison.
• Wow, I had no idea that BBEdit had a file comparison tool. So I checked it out, and it sucks. FileMerge.app is a much better tool, the graphic indication of changes makes everything work so easily.

General[edit]

Basic general information about file comparison software.

Compare features[edit]

API / editor features[edit]

Other features[edit]

Some other features which did not fit in previous table

Aspects[edit]

What aspects can be / are compared?

Timezone effects[edit]

When files are transferred across time zones and between Microsoft FAT and NTFSfile systems, the timestamp displayed by the same file may change, so that identical files with different storage histories are deemed different by a comparer that requires the timestamps to match. The difference is an exact number of quarters of an hour up to 95 (same minutes modulo 15 and seconds) if the file was transported across zones; there is also a one-hour difference within a single zone caused by the transition between standard time and daylight saving time (DST). Some, but not all, file comparison and synchronisation software can be configured to ignore the DST and time-zone differences.^[39] Software known to have daylight-saving compensation is marked in the Aspects table.

See also[edit]

References[edit]

1. ^Scooter Software
2. ^Coode Software
3. ^Compare++ Operating system information
4. ^Michael Kifer
5. ^Ediff requires a diff utility to function. As of December 2017, diff is not bundled with Emacs or Windows, so use of Ediff in a Windows environment requires installation of both Emacs and a diff implementation like GNU diff.
6. ^PrestoSoft
7. ^Microsoft
8. ^NeXT Product Marketing (Fall 1993). 'What's New in Release 3.2?'. NEXTSTEP In Focus. NeXT Computer, Inc. 3 (4). Retrieved 18 July 2014.
9. ^Guiffy Software
10. ^JetBrains
11. ^jedit.org
12. ^'Otto Bruggeman'. Archived from the original on 2012-04-15. Retrieved 2006-01-12.Cite uses deprecated parameter dead-url= (help)
13. ^Installing Kompare in Windows
14. ^Stephen Kennedy
15. ^Meld/Windows
16. ^Notepad++ compare plugin
17. ^Pretty Diff
18. ^tkdiff
19. ^Christian Ghisler
20. ^Bare Bones Software, Inc.
21. ^vim license
22. ^Microsoft
23. ^Dean Grimm
24. ^ ^abWinMerge in Wine
25. ^USC CSSE
26. ^ ^abCompare logical sections (class, methods)
27. ^Examdiff
28. ^Examdiff
29. ^ ^abVisual Rename
30. ^https://github.com/git/git/tree/master/contrib/diff-highlight
31. ^gnu.org Support-for-Version-Control
32. ^through a plug-in
33. ^through a plug-in
34. ^UTF8, UTF16, MBCS, SJIS, over 150 file encoding and character set formats
35. ^Notepad++ FTP plugin
36. ^'tortoisehg / stable / wiki / FAQ —'. Bitbucket.org. Archived from the original on 2010-07-15. Retrieved 2010-07-06.Cite uses deprecated parameter dead-url= (help)
37. ^'Using WinMerge with other tools – WinMerge 2.12 Manual'. Winmerge.org. Retrieved 2010-07-06.
38. ^'About'. WinMerge. Retrieved 2010-07-06.
39. ^Example: 'Beyond Compare' help describes a user setting 'timezone differences – ignores timestamp differences that are multiples of an exact hour.'

Meld

Being free and open source, Meld is a very popular tool on Windows. It supports three-way comparing and merging and lets you edit files directly from the comparison view. Apart from diffing files, Meld also supports comparison of folders.

Beyond Compare

The Beyond Compare team makes a fine diff tool for Windows (as well as Mac and Linux, by the way). It goes well beyond (pun intended) diffing simple text and also allows comparing PDF, Excel and image files. The 'Pro' version also includes a solid three-way merge.

Araxis Merge

Just like Beyond Compare, Araxis Merge supports more than just text and image files. It lets you also compare office documents (like MS Word, Excel, Powerpoint, or ODF). For people working on both Windows and Mac, it's good to know that a single license is valid for both platforms.

KDiff3

Another free and open source tool answers to the name of KDiff3. The project hasn't see many updates in recent years, but it remains a solid diff and merge tool that should satisfy basic needs.

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DeltaWalker

Much like Araxis, the DeltaWalker diff tool also lets you compare office files. However, it goes one step further by letting you compare file archives like ZIP, JAR, and TAR files. If you're regularly performing comparisons on a folder basis, it's good to know that DeltaWalker shines with great performance in this area.

P4Merge

Perforce, the company best known for its enterprise version control platform, also offers a solid diff tool: P4Merge is free of charge and comes with a basic feature set that makes it an interesting option.

Snipping tool for apple mac. Skitch for Mac users.

Code Compare

Besides offering all the standard diff and merge capabilities, Code Compare comes with some special features like syntax highligthing and a VisualStudio integration.
The basic version can be used free of charge, while the Professional Edition delivers the full feature set.

Integrations

Another aspect to watch out for is integrations: before choosing your favorite tool, you should make sure that it plays nicely with the rest of your tool chain. I can already confirm that most of the mentioned tools work seamlessly with Tower, our own Git client.

If you don't need the power of a dedicated Diff tool application, the integrated diff views in Tower might even be sufficient for you:

See for yourself and try it 30 days for free.

Conclusion

Tools To Compare Documents

Diff & merge apps are amongst the most underestimated tools. But a good one can be really helpful in a lot of situations. Try one of the above and see for yourself!

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Document Comparison Software

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