I have two questions:
Can you please share with us a list of the kinds of differences that can be found with the GroupDocs Comparison tool between two Word docs? The only things I saw on your website are differences in the content and font style. Is that correct?
I tried testing the tool using your demo site here, but it’s not working for me, it just hangs indefinitely on the loading screen. How can I run a test with 2 word docs?
- Can you please share with us a list of the kinds of differences that can be found with the GroupDocs Comparison tool between two Word docs? The only things I saw on your website are differences in the content and font style. Is that correct?
Yes, this is correct. Aspose.Words try to replicate the behavior of MS Word application and the same happen for document comparison. The compare document behavior of MS Words app make focus on content and styles, so the Aspose.Words API do the same.
- I tried testing the tool using your demo site here, but it’s not working for me, it just hangs indefinitely on the loading screen. How can I run a test with 2 word docs?
Can you please attach your documents for review. Additionally you can use the Aspose.Words API package to build your own application. Please, check the following example:
Document doc1 = new Document("C:\\Temp\\v1.docx");
Document clonDoc1 = (Document)doc1.Clone(true);
Document doc2 = new Document("C:\\Temp\\v2.docx");
Aspose.Words.Comparing.CompareOptions options = new Aspose.Words.Comparing.CompareOptions()
{
//CompareMoves = true,
Granularity = Granularity.WordLevel,
IgnoreCaseChanges = true,
IgnoreComments = true,
IgnoreDmlUniqueId = false,
IgnoreFields = true,
IgnoreFootnotes = false,
IgnoreFormatting = true,
IgnoreHeadersAndFooters = true,
IgnoreTables = false,
IgnoreTextboxes = true,
Target = ComparisonTargetType.New
};
var author = string.IsNullOrEmpty(clonDoc1.BuiltInDocumentProperties.Author)
? (string.IsNullOrEmpty(doc2.BuiltInDocumentProperties.Author)
? "Author" : doc2.BuiltInDocumentProperties.Author)
: clonDoc1.BuiltInDocumentProperties.Author;
clonDoc1.Compare(doc2, author, DateTime.Now, options);
clonDoc1.Save("C:\\Temp\\output.docx");
We are looking for a tool that can also compare formatting differences, like paragraph spacing, tabs, and alignment/indentation differences. Can the GroupDocs Comparison tool find these kinds of formatting differences as well? Attached are the two documents we’d like to compare that have these sorts of formatting differences. Thank you!
ACR4_E.docx (41.3 KB)
ACR25_used in AL (modified).docx (35.4 KB)
@sclocker yes Aspose.Words as MS Word application detect those types of changes. I’m attaching the result of the comparison of the two documents that you posted:
output.docx (35.6 KB)
P.S: I modify the alignment of the last paragraph in the modified document so you can check the result of the comparison when the alignment is changed.
Thank you for your quick replies! What is the difference between Aposte.Words and GroupDocs Comparison?
Also, do either Aposte.Words or GroupDocs Compare have a user interface to make navigating through the document changes easier? Or is the output always a single tracked changes Word document? The output you show is quite “busy” with all the changes, so we are hoping to find a tool with a user interface that could allow us to filter which changes we see, or different view options to see the original/modified/combined documents in various ways. Thank you!
@sclocker I need to clarify that I’m not an expert in GroupDocs products. If you have any doubts regarding GroupDocs Comparison products, you should post them in their own forum.
The biggest difference between Aspose.Words and GroupDocs Comparison is the target of the products. Aspose.Words provides an API package that allows you to manage documents just like MS Word, while GroupDocs Comparison is an API as well, but the focus of it is to compare documents supporting different formats and processing them depending of the format. Therefore, Aspose.Words is an API package available in several languages that allow you manage MS Word documents as MS Word application does, while GroupDocs.Comparison is an API that restrict it behavior to compare documents.
Both products provide no code apps to compare documents.
https://products.aspose.app/words/comparison
https://products.groupdocs.app/comparison/family
What happened to the CompareMoves property? It’s still listed in the API reference but not a valid property in version 23.3 (what we’re using in production) or 23.6 (the latest version).
@joe_lopez I apologize for the confusion. I can confirm that the CompareMoves property of the Aspose.Words.Comparing.CompareOptions class is available in versions 23.3 and 23.6 of the Aspose.Words API.
Actually, the apology is mine. I use LinqPad to test a lot of code snippets and it was telling me that property wasn’t defined for some strange reason. When I put the same code in Visual Studio, it built just fine. Thank you for your quick reply.
Will do.
The reason for my original question is that I found differences in doc comparisons done in Word and Aspose for some documents we have. I’ll create a new post for this.
Thanks again.
