Compare (see also)

The compare utility allows you to compare your current work file to the most recently checked in revision, or to compare one archived revision to another. You can also use it on the project level to get a quick overview of how the QVCS archive files compare to the work files in the same directory.

For single file operations, clicking the Compare toolbar button will automatically launch the defined visual compare utility and compare the work file with the most recent revision in the associated archive. If the work file is identical to the newest revision, QVCS will simply notify you and won't bother to launch the compare utility. For multiple file operations or for uncontrolled files, the Compare tool is disabled.

To compare two revisions in a QVCS archive, right click on the desired file and select Compare Revisions from the context menu. This will bring up a dialog from which you can select the revisions you wish to compare. Clicking the "Compare revisions" button will launch the visual compare utility.

Note that the compare operation causes QWin to minimize itself and wait for the compare utility to complete. This means that you must close the compare utility before you can perform any additional operations with QWin.

Setting the Visual Compare Utility

In order for the compare tool to function, you must have a visual compare utility defined. We recommend that you use Examdiff. We have a freeware version of this utility available on our web site, and you can download it here.

To define Examdiff as your visual compare utility, navigate to Admin→Preferences... and select the Utilities tab. In the "Visual Compare Utility Command Line" field, enter:

C:\ExamDiff.exe "%s" "%s"

Naturally, you should replace "C:\ExamDiff.exe" with an accurate path that points to the location of Examdiff.exe on your machine.

Compare... Dialog

This is the dialog that appears when you select the Compare Revisions option from a file's context menu.

Each field has the following meaning:

You've elected to compare:

This list box shows the complete list of revisions and labels that exist for the selected QVCS archive (The labels appear toward the bottom of the list). If you select a single entry from this list, the button to the right of the list box will read "Compare to work file" to indicate that when you click on that button, you will compare the selected entry with the work file shown in the "With the work file" field. If you select two entries from this list (using the Ctrl key), the text on the button changes to "Compare revisions" to indicate that you will compare the two selected revisions to one another. If you select more than two entries in the list, the button to the right will be disabled, since there isn't anything useful that QVCS can do in that circumstance.

From the archive file:

This read-only field identifies the QVCS archive from which QVCS will get the selected revision(s). It's shown so you can verify that QVCS is performing the operation with the archive that you expect.

With the work file:

This read-only field identifies the full name of the work file that QVCS will use for the comparison (if you're comparing a revision to a work file). You can use the [...] button to select a different work file from a file selection dialog.

Compare Project Files Dialog

Clicking on the Compare toolbar button when a directory or project node is selected will display the following dialog.

If a work file is different than the newest revision on the default branch, that work file's name will be displayed in red in both the archive and work file list box. Any locked files will have a lock bitmap displayed next to them.

From this dialog you can get the latest revision of a file, check out a file, lock an archive, compare a file, or create an archive for a file that doesn't yet have an archive.

The window is re-sizable.

Toolbar Operations

Get

Check Out

Add

Check In

Undo Check-out

Lock

Label

File Groups

Sort Revisions

Filter Revisions

Filter Files

Compare

See also: the corresponding qdiff command line utility.