Directory Comparison and "Ignore lines"

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markros
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Directory Comparison and "Ignore lines"

Post by markros »

Hi, I'd like to know if it's possible to achieve line filtering of text files during Directory Comparison?
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psguru
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Re: Directory Comparison and "Ignore lines"

Post by psguru »

Yes, if you use the "Full file comparison" option under Options | Directory Comparison, all options form the Text Comparison page will be used.
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dchirgwin
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Re: Directory Comparison and "Ignore lines"

Post by dchirgwin »

I'm trying to do this using ExamDiff Pro Master 12.0.1.10 (64-bit) and it doesn't appear to be working.
My directories are based on the same files, but one with Windows linebreaks and one with Linux linebreaks. The directory comparison shows all files are different, but when I click on a file to see what the differences are, it opens a new (text comparison) window and says these are identical files.
Am I doing something wrong?
I have selected "Perform full file comparison" under "Directory Comparison Options"
-----------------------------
Update:
The files that are actually different are highlighted in a different color, so I can get by with that for now. However, the filters (e.g. "Show Only Differences") don't work (i.e. don't use the "ignores").
------------------------------
Another update:
No, the color-coding is not reliable. Some files colored differently are identical and some are not.
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psguru
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Re: Directory Comparison and "Ignore lines"

Post by psguru »

It's hard to follow this without steps to reproduce. Could you please provide a zipped file with your directories and exported options, as well as screenshots illustrating the issue?
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dchirgwin
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Re: Directory Comparison and "Ignore lines"

Post by dchirgwin »

I have looked again and I think I was getting confused by the color-coding.
It appears that the older of the two files shows in red/green and the newer shows in purple/blue. That's fine - I just misunderstood.
However, the underlying problem remains, that identical files with different linebreak styles are showing as different.

First, I have attached a screenshot showing two large directories (this is my actual source code). The statistics pane says there are no differences, but with the filter set to "Show Only Differences" all files are shown. Also, the status column shows "Error!" for every file.

After more digging around trying to reproduce this, I have found that the problem only occurs when I am trying to compare a local Windows directory with a remote directory that is mounted from a Linux fileserver (actually, from WSL2). If I copy the directory from the Linux remote drive to my local drive, it all works as expected. I'm thinking this is more a problem with my network filesystem than with ExamDiff Pro.

So it looks like I can't give you files that reproduce this. But I'm wondering what sort of thing might cause the status to be "Error!" - could this be something like access permissions? The odd thing is that in file comparison mode, it can access both files without any errors.

Any thoughts?
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EDP Screenshot1.png
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dchirgwin
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Re: Directory Comparison and "Ignore lines"

Post by dchirgwin »

More information:

This is nothing to do with linebreak styles.
If I try to compare two directories which are both on the remote Linux drive, and both contain files with Linux linebreaks, it correctly detects Added / Deleted files but shows status of "Error!" for files that exist in both directories, even though they are literally byte-for-byte identical.
See attached screenshot.
A file comparison does not give any errors and correctly declares the files identical. It's only when the directory comparison is trying to compare both files that the error occurs.

So there would appear to be some difference in how files are compared during a directory comparison as opposed to during a file comparison.
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MudGuard
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Re: Directory Comparison and "Ignore lines"

Post by MudGuard »

on your screen shot 1, all file sizes are different ...

In Options, Text Compare, is the checkbox for Ignore -> Line break styles checked?
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Re: Directory Comparison and "Ignore lines"

Post by psguru »

I suspect that there are some issues with Linux mounting that cause directory comparison issues (timeout?) and don't - in file comparison. Maybe there are some errors in the Event Log.
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