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An improved way to manually align incorrectly matched comparisons (the current way to do it is very cumbersome). No diff tool is going to match things up perfectly, so a quick way to fix it is ideal
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Actually, I find BC’s method to be pretty good. I’ve changed the keyboard bindings (ToolsOptionsKeyboardAlign Manually) so I do this:
Click the left line you want to align.
Hit space.
Click the right line
Hit space.
Now the two lines you selected should be aligned.
I’m just using BC again after a break with Araxis Merge, so I don’t remember if it does as good of a job with multiple alignments.
For anyone on Linux or with Gtk available to them, there is a great open source diff program called Meld. (http://meld.sourceforge.net/) It is very similar to Araxis Merge (fancy graphics, 3-way diff…)
Beyond compare is indeed great tool. The price is only complete icing. It provides a lot of simplistic comparing, but it’s directory comparing is really useful, fast, and relaible. It takes a little getting used to, but once you’ve used it a few times you will completely appreciate the power for the price. For those comparing Araxis Merge and don’t the price is a problem, don’t think, just buy Araxis merge. It’s a better tool (I’ve used both extensively in coding and file maintenance efforts; multi-years each), from it’s report generation capabilities (yes I know BC2 has it also, but is much more limited) to it’s sophistication and accuracy of it’s merge engine. For the price of BC2, you will find no better (IMHO) tool to allign directories, files, or lines within a file. I never stop getting amazed at what it accomplishes. The rule based filtering quickly gets rid of the cruft files and allows quick focus on the concerns or areas of change; be they file or directory. It also offers a simplistic save these settings as a named compare allowing storage of session configuration. Same version upgrade and 1 year buyer protection upgrade. This could be important since they are about to release 3.0 and raise the price. Very nice tool. For the price, you cannot go wrong. It works VERY WELL!
If you’re on the edge, the new 3-way merge version is coming out in July (pro version only contains 3-way); scheduled July 31st 2008. Standard will also be available; equivalent to BC2). Price is going up, amount depends on the license you choose. If you buy BC2 now, you 3.0 for free; although BC2 to BC3 Pro will still cost a difference upgrade fee.
Araxis just recently released an update to Merge that natively supports XML. I’m testing it out now, but it looks pretty nice so far. It appears to use the BC’s tidy approach without tidy (i.e., it does not appear to parse XML per say, but it formats it nicely prior to comparison).
In regards to Araxis Merge’s XML support, it is not like BC’s tidy approach at all. The formatted XML is only displayed that way. The original XML file remains as it was. Merges you make to a single element in the XML do not result in the entire file being altered. Only the specific element you merged gets changed.
Scooter Software Just Came Out With Beyond Compare Three!
Actually, I was a little turned off by their last interface but the improvements here are way beyond the look and feel, I just bought it after 2 years on the other version and its exactly what I wanted to see.
I have been using BC for many years. It is really helpful when merging code and look for changes. The right click comparison feature is very useful. After many years of use I still haven’t seen any erroneous behaviour.
One great option with later versions of 2 and beyond is a portable (flash-drive) install. Combined with the personal licensing terms allowing one user to run it on any number of computers, means you can have it available anywhere with ‘plug-and-diff’ convenience.
The other great new feature in BC3 is the ‘ignore replacements’ feature. If you’ve changed a (or a few) strings to a different value in many places between two files, and want to check for other differences, you can right-click on difference text, choose ‘replacement’, and select ‘ignore’. You get an immediate visual indication of differences other than the ones you know have been changed en masse. Helped me visualize one issue at work that could have been tedious to resolve otherwise.
I’ve not used anything but WinMerge (http://winmerge.sourceforge.net/) for ages - the main improvement I’d like to see is a ‘whole tree’ view in the directory comparison view.