17.1.1. |
Why are there two executable files, WinMerge.exe and WinMergeU.exe? |
|
|
17.1.2. |
That splash screen is annoying, how do I turn it off? |
From menu, select -> -> -> |
|
17.1.3. |
When wanting to compare folders, I cannot select a folder in Browse-dialog? |
Browse to the folder you want to compare (folder contents is shown in the dialog). Do not select any of the files or subfolders, just select the Folder Selection" is shown in filename editbox. If you already selected any of the files or subfolders, just write some nonsense to the filename editbox and select the Open-button. When the filename editbox doesn't contain any existing filename then WinMerge opens the folder. -button when " |
|
17.1.4. |
Does WinMerge support merging three files? Sometimes it is called 3-way merge, where one file is ancestor. This would be useful for version control! |
Unfortunately not. We acknowledge it would be good feature but have no plans to implement it in near future. This can be somewhat worked around by using two WinMerge instances. (One developer has begun preliminary work on this feature, but it is not yet available, even in experimental releases.) |
|
17.1.5. |
Do you have any plans to support other operating systems than Windows? |
Not currently. If somebody wants to help/work with cross-platform support (using wxWidgets for example) we are interested, of course. |
|
17.1.6. |
There is no CVS integration?! |
Which kind of CVS integration WinMerge should have? Adding CVS client features to WinMerge is questionable since there are many good CVS clients already. Conflict file resolution is a feature we are planning to add in future releases. |
|
17.1.7. |
What is MRU (list)? What it means? |
MRU is the abbreviation for "Most Recently Used", and means the history lists in the Open-dialog which contain the 20 last used files/paths per side. |
|
17.1.8. |
Can WinMerge open Open Office files? |
Yes, enable Detect archive type from file signature option in Archive Options. |
|
17.1.9. |
Why do large files sometimes show as different in the folder view, but come up as identical in the merge editor? |
This is because WinMerge uses the "Quick Compare" method for large files always. It allows WinMerge to compare large files more efficiently. To test if this is causing the behavior you're seeing, you could raise the limit for the Quick Compare threshold for large files. It is stored in the registry as: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Thingamahoochie\WinMerge\Settings\QuickMethodLimit You may consider raising this limit if you constantly compare large text files. Be careful to not raise it too much "for just to be sure". 100 MB is too much. The default value for the limit is 4MB (0x400000). |
|
17.1.10. |
WinMerge shows an error (or even crashes!) complaining it cannot load CompareMSWordFiles.dll and/or CompareMSExcelFiles.dll! |
Mentioned files are plugins written with Visual Basic (6.0). WinMerge installer does not contain Visual Basic runtime files so those plugins cannot be loaded. You can:
|
17.2.1. |
WinMerge does not start and complains about missing DLL files (mfc71.dll, mfc71u.dll, msvcr71.dll, msvcp71.dll) |
When installing from archive (zip, 7z) file you need also Runtimes-package, which contains those files. See the Install instructions. |
17.4.1. |
WinMerge says "Binary files are different", but I am not comparing binary files? |
If you are using WinMerge.exe (not WinMergeU.exe), then your files may be Unicode files. WinMerge.exe cannot handle Unicode files. Please try comparing files with WinMergeU.exe if you have Windows NT4, Windows 2000 or newer Windows version. |
|
17.4.2. |
WinMerge cannot compare registry files (*.reg)? |
Windows registry files (*.reg) are Unicode files (UTF-16 or UCS-2) -- see the question "I cannot merge binary files?" for a workaround. |
|
17.4.3. |
WinMerge tells my files are binary files even when they are not? |
There is one or more zero-bytes in your file(s). If WinMerge finds zero-bytes from files, it considers the files to be binary files. You can try to remove those zero-bytes from files. Alternatively, you may open the files with the DisplayBinaryFiles plugin. This plugin allows viewing binary files, but not editing them. If you have a very recent version of WinMerge (2.6.0 and newer), you may use the new EditBinaryFiles plugin, which does allow editing binary files (using an escape scheme for representing non-printable characters). |
|
17.4.4. |
I cannot merge binary files? |
WinMerge 2.6.0 (and newer) includes a binary file editor (plugin EditBinaryFiles.dll). |
17.9.1. |
Is there way to create patch files from the commandline? |
No. It may be added in later versions but until then Win32 port of diffutils can be used. The Win32 port of diffutils (and patch) can be downloaded from GnuWin32 project from SourceForge: http://sourceforge.net/projects/gnuwin32 |
|
17.9.2. |
Can patches be applied using WinMerge? |
No. The patch tool from GnuWin32 project can be used for patch applying since WinMerge produces GNU/diffutils compatible patch files. See above question. |