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XML Diff and Merge Tool                                                                    | Overview | FAQ | Requirements | Discussion |

OVERVIEW
The Compare and Merge Tool for XML is a Java program that can be used for reconciling or understanding changes that a single user has made to his XML document OR for reconciling or understanding changes that several people have made to a single document.

You pick an XML document to be the base and another one to compare it with. The tool points out each difference from the base by use of symbols and color. You then walk through each difference and decide whether to include the difference or not.


FAQ

  1. What is different from other file comparison tools, like windiff?

    The Compare and Merge Tool for XML works on the DOM tree, so the result is not a line-based comparison, but a merged tree view of the two files with differences tagged relative to the base XML file. The tool compares two XML files, called base and modified files, and, optionally, produces a third XML file, which is the merged file.

    Differences are shown with an X icon in front, and the goal is to resolve all the changes. The modified/new/removed nodes have popup actions that let the user select whether the change should come from the base file or from the modified file. The reconciling action applies recursively to the entire subtree rooted at the node tagged as a difference.

  2. When invoking help from the menu or pressing F1 I get an error. What else should I do?

    By default, the browser is Netscape, and if the browser is running, you don't need to do anything, otherwise select File->Preferences->Help and enter the full path to your browser.

  3. What is the comparison algorithm?

    Currently we do a tree matching using a node identification based on attributes of type ID, or based on content. We also want to make the identity function customizable, but the current version does not have such support.

REQUIREMENTS
Click here to view the Installation Procedures

XML Diff and Merge Tool Platform Requirements
Operating System Tested on Windows NT and AIX
Java tool JDK 1.1.6 and Swing 1.0.3
Additional Java packages XML Parser in Java 1.1.4 (or later)


XML Diff and Merge Tool Installation Procedures

Installation Procedures

On NT:

  1. Edit the xmldiff.bat file in the bin directory and modify the JDK.

  2. SWING and XMLDIFF variables to point to the installation directories for JDK1.1.6.

  3. Swing 1.0.3 and the directory where you unzipped the Compare and Merge Tool for XML.

  4. To launch the tool, run the xmldiff.bat program you just edited.

On AIX (Korn shell):

  1. Edit the xmldiff.sh file in the bin directory and modify the JDK.

  2. SWING and XMLDIFF variables to point to the jdk1.1.6 and Swing 1.0.3 classes and the directory where you unzipped the Compare and Merge Tool for XML.

  3. To launch the tool, run the xmldiff.sh program you just edited.

  4. Make sure the file has executable permissions on your machine.


      DOWNLOADS
      File Size Comments  
      xmldiff.zip 837 KB ZIP file containing XML Diff and Merge Tool package.