Config Compare

This is an application that aims to compare two files for which the order of the lines is not signiricant.

This mostly includes configuration files (the original reason for writing this program) but also XML files - my first webapp stored their data in XML format and this can be used to compare different versions. I'm also thinking about other formats like css, config files written in Python or json, etc.

The main screen is divided into three columns:

main screen

The first column depicts the structure of the two documents after they are merged and sorted. The next two colums show the data values for specific entries in both files, and thus make the actual comparison possible. Text is shown in various colours: red means there is a difference, green means there's only a value on the left-hand side and blue means there's only one on the right-hand side. When there's no difference, the text is plain black.

Currently there is no merging available like in other diff utilities.

/docs/compare-tool/file-menu.png /docs/compare-tool/help-menu.png

The following actions are possible (from the menu or a keyboard shortcut):

  • open - select the files to compare and the method of comparison

  • compare - do the comparison and show the results

  • exit - quit the application

  • help/about - show some text explaining what this application is for

This last option simply shows this screen:

/docs/compare-tool/about.png

It's also shown on firing up the application.