XI. Are there any apps that can display files in parallel, highlighting (in color) the differences between them?

1. ediff, developed by Michael Kifer, is a visual interface to diff and patch, accessed within emacs, that highlights the differences between two files in color. It features:
   • highlights differing region in multiple colors, including differences within the region;
   • view the files being compared side-by-side (windows split vertically), one-over-the-other (windows split horizontally) or in separate windows (frames);
   • either of the files being compared can be patched with the differences of the other, and old differences can also be recovered.
   Ediff is part of the standard Emacs and Xemacs distribution.

   Periodic updates are available at:
   ftp://ftp.cs.sunysb.edu/pub/TechReports/kifer

2. mgdiff, developed by Daniel Williams, is a graphical front-end to diff. When the user selects two files for comparison, it runs the diff command, parses the output and presents the results graphically. This presentation can also be used to generate a user-specified merge of the two files into a third file.

   This program's appearance is based upon a program called gdiff, available for Silicon Graphics workstations.

   The latest version of mgdiff is available for ftp at:

   ftp://ftp.x.org:/contrib/applications/mgdiff.tar.gz

3. tkdiff, developed by John Klassa, is a graphical front-end for the standard Unix diff utility, based on Tcl/Tk. Its features include:
   • Highlighted difference regions;
   • side-by-side viewing of files;
   • linked (synchronized) scrolling of the two files;
   • random access to difference regions.
   The latest version, 1.0b9, is available at:

   ftp://ftp.neosoft.com/languages/tcl/alcatel/code/tkdiff-1.0b9.tar.gz

4. xdiff, developed by Paul Lucas, is another graphical diff tool based on the SGI gdiff utility.

   It is available at:

   ftp://ftp.best.com/pub/pjl/software/xdiff-1.1b3.tar.gz

5. tkxcd, is a diff front end that has a look and feel similar to Atria ClearCase's xcleardiff.

   Available at:
   ftp://ftp.redhat.com/pub/contrib/RPMS/tkxcd-1.1.0-1.i386.rpm
   ftp://ftp.redhat.com/pub/contrib/SRPMS/tkxcd-1.1.0-1.src.rpm
   

6. yaxp, developed by Rudy Wortel, is yet another xdiff program based on the SGI gdiff utility. It can display the differences of a file and up to four revisions of that file. The text is presented side by side with the differences aligned and highlighted in colour. xdiff can be used to produce a merged version combining any or all of the differences.

   The latest version, 3.3 is available at: http://reality.sgi.com/rudy/xdiff/

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