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Document:	ULTRIX Worksystem Software Guide to the dxdiff Visual Differences Program
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ULTRIX
Worksystem Software
a

Guide to the dxdiff Visual Differences Program

Order Number: AA-MA89B- TE

ULTRIX Worksystem Software

Guide to the dxdiff Visual Differences Program

Order Number: AA-MA89B-TE

Product Version:
Operating System and Version:

digital equipment corporation
maynard, massachusetts

ULTRIX Worksystem Software, Version 2.2
ULTRIX-32, Version 3.1 or higher

Restricted Rights: Use, duplication, or disclosure by the U.S. Government is subject to restrictions as
set forth in subparagraph (c) (1) (ii) of the Rights in Technical Data and Computer Software clause of
DFARS 252.227-7013.

The information in this document is subject to change without notice and should not be construed as a
commitment by Digital Equipment Corporation. Digital Equipment Corporation assumes no
responsibility for any errors that may appear in this document.
The software described in this document is furnished under a license and may be used or copied only in
accordance with the terms of such license.
No responsibility is assumed for the use or reliability of software on equipment that is not supplied by
Digital or its affiliated companies.

The following are trademarks of Digital Equipment Corporation:
CDA
DEC
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DEC station
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DDIS

DTIF
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MicroVAX
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ULTRIX
ULTRIX Mail Connection
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~DmDDmD

UNIX is a registered trademark of AT&T in the USA and other countries.
X Window System, X, and XlI are registered trademarks of MIT.
This manual was written and produced by the Open Software Publications group.

Contents

About This Manual

Audience ..........................................................................................................

Organization ....................................................................................................

Related Documents ........................................................................................

Conventions ...................................... ............................................. ..................

Guide to the dxdiff Visual Differences Program

Starting dxdiff ...... .......... ............................ ............................. .............. .........

Selecting Files to Compare ..................... .................. ...................................

Displaying the Differences ............................................................................

Moving Between Differences

Changing the Characteristics of the Display .............................................

Comparing a New Set of Files ...................................................................

Exiting from dxdiff .......................................................................................

Customizing dxdiff .........................................................................................

Figures
1:

The Main dxdiff Window .......................................................................

The Difference Display.. ......... ..... .......... ..... ........ ............ ....... ..... ......... ...

Display Showing Filled Polygons ...... ........... ........... .... ........... ............ ...

iv Contents

About This Manual

The Guide to the dxdiff Visual Differences Program describes how to use
the dxdiff differences program to compare files visually.

Audience
The audience for this manual is an ULTRIX end user or programmer who
is familiar with DECwindows.

Organization
This manual discusses the basic tasks that you need to know to run dxdiff.
The first tasks discussed are starting the dxdiff application, comparing files,
and manipulating the way in which differences are displayed. The next
sections describe how to compare new sets of files and how to exit from
dxdiff when you have finished comparing files. At the end of the manual
there is a section on customizing the appearance of dxd iff.

Related Documents
DECwindows User's Guide
Describes basic DECwindows techniques. You should read this manual
if you are not familiar with the DECwindows user interface.

Conve ntions
The following conventions are used in this manual:
special

In text, each mention of a specific command, option,
partition, pathname, directory, or file is presented in this
typeface.

name(n)

References to ULTRIX commands, system calls, and
subroutines include the section numbers in the ULTRIX32 Reference Pages where they are documented.
Commands that include the section number (IX) are
documented in the ULTRIX Worksystem Software
Reference Pages.

Guide to the dxdiff Visual Differences Program

The dxdiff application is a visual differences program that gives you a
graphical display of the differences between two files. You can use dxdiff
to compare different versions of ASCII text files.
The dxdiff application uses the diff( 1) program to compare two files line by
line, and then it displays the differences between them as areas of
highlighted text.
When the differences between the files are displayed, you can scroll
through the files or use push buttons to move from one difference to
another.
This manual is intended to be read as an overview of dxdiff, to show you
how to do the following tasks:
•
•
•

Start dxdiff
Select files to compare
Display the differences between files

•

Move through the differences in a file

•

Change the characteristics of the display

•

Compare a new set of files

•

Exit from dxdiff

•

Customize dxdiff

Starting dxdiff
To start dxdiff, enter the following command in a terminal emulator
window:

% dxdiff &
You do not need to supply any file names as you can select files from
within dxdiff.
When dxdiff starts, it displays the window shown in Figure l.
The title bar contains the application name, followed by the window
number. The first window displayed is always labeled o. The windows are
numbered to save confusion if you have more than one dxd iff window
running at the same time.
The push button region at the bottom of the window contains the Next
Diff and Prev Diff buttons for each of the text regions.

2 Guide to the dxdiff Visual Differences Program

1b!]5JJ

III
•• dHdiffdisp lay:O

Hp~p

Files Options D iffet"e nces

.6.

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I

I
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N~~xt O~ff

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PY(~v DH"f

I~ D
~ rev OHf
ZK-0041 U-HC

'- Difference Region
Text Re gions -

Figure 1: The Main dxdiff Window

Guide to the dxdiff Visual Differences Program 3

Selecting Files to Compare
To select two files to compare, choose the Open Files ... item from the File
menu. Two file selection dialog boxes are displayed: leftfileselector:O and
rightfileselector:O. Each dialog box lists the files in the current directory.
To change directory, type the pathname of the directory in the File Filter
box and then click on the Apply button. The file selection box recognizes
the tilde (.., character, which represents yOill' home directory.
To select a file, either click on the file name and then click on the OK
button, or double-click on the file name. You can also type the file name
in the S election box.
You must select one file from each of the dialog boxes.

Displaying the Differences
To display the differences between the two files that you have selected,
choose the Do Differences item from the Differences menu.
The time taken for dxdiff to display the differences will depend on the
length of the files and the number of differences between them.
Note that trailing blanks (spaces and tabs) are not included as differences,
and are ignored. Any other strings of blanks are also treated as equal and
do not appear as differences.
If there are no differences between the two selected files, if either of the
files is a non-ASCII file, or if you have selected a directory instead of a
file, an appropriate message dialog box is displayed.
Figme 2 shows the display of differences between two text files.
The files are displayed in two text windows that appear to the left and
right of a central difference region. Each text region displays the name of
its currently selected file.
The differences between the files are connected by lines running across the
central difference box. These lines show the relationships between the
differences in the files, and where the differences are located in the files.
The differences in the files are shown as areas of highlighted text; common
text is not highlighted.

4 Guide to the dxdiff Visual Differences Program

File Name

Different
Text

This line is Ule same
in botll.
Unes which are Ule ; S t u l l t i - - - -

are not
highlighted.

Ne)"1: 0 iff

Pre\' 0 iff

Ne)"1: 0 iff

The Same
Text

Pt·e\' 0 iff
ZK-0042U-HC

Lines Across The Difference Box

Figure 2: The Difference Display

Guide to the dxdiff Visual Differences Program 5

When you start dxdiff, the display is set up to give you linked vertical
scrolling, and lines connecting the areas of different text.
When you have linked vertical scrolling, and you scroll one of the files, the
other file is scrolled with it line by line. When scrolling is unlinked, you
can scroll the files independently of each other, viewing different parts of
each file at the same time.
To find out how and in what ways you can change the difference display,
see the section Changing the Characteristics of the Display.

Moving Between Differences
You can use the scroll bars to browse through the displayed files. You
can also use the Next Diff and Prev Diff buttons, at the bottom of each
text region, to move forward or backward between the differences in either
file.
When you select the Next Diff button, dxdiff searches forward from the
current difference (in the center of the difference display) to the next
difference in that file. The application then moves that difference to the
center of the display.
When you select the Prev Diff button, dxdiff searches backward from the
current difference to find the previous difference in the file. The
application then moves that difference to the center of the display.
These buttons are useful for quickly moving between the differences in a
long file, especially where there are only a few differences.

Changing the Characteristics of the Display
To change the characteristics of the display, use the items on the Options
menu.
You can control the following characteristics:
•

Linked or unlinked vertical and horizontal scrolling

•

Displaying lines or filled polygons in the difference region

•

Displaying line numbers in the difference region

The default for the scrolling is linked scrolling. To scroll one file
independently of the other, choose the Linked Scrolling Off item. To
return to linked scrolling, choose the Linked Scrolling On item.
When you start dxdiff, the differences between the files are connected by
lines across the difference region. Filled polygons can be used instead of
lines to emphasize the relationship between the differences in the two files.
Differences connected by filled polygons are illustrated in Figure 3.

6 Guide to the dxdiff Visual Differences Program

To display filled polygons, choose the Render Diffs As Filled Polygons item.
To display lines again, choose the Render Diffs As Lines item.
Note that when you scroll a display which contains filled polygons, the
filled polygons change to thin lines during the scrolling. When you stop
scrolling, the lines revert back to filled polygons.
To display line numbers at the beginning and end of the difference lines or
filled polygons, choose the Display Diff Line Numbers item. To turn the
line numbers off, choose the No Diff Line Numbers item. The default is
for line numbers not to be displayed. Line numbers are shown in Figure

Guide to the dxdiff Visual Differences Program 7

Ne~1: Oiff

Pre\' Diff

Ne:-.t Diff

Prev Diff
ZK-0043U-HC

Filled Polygons

Figure 3: Display Showing Filled Polygons

8 Guide to the dxdiff Visual Differences Program

Compa ring a New Set of Files
You can compare a new set of files and display the differences either in
the current dxdiff window, or in a new dxdiff window. If you display the
differences in the current window, the contents of that window are
overwritten. If you display the differences in a new window, the current
window is preserved, and you can still refer to it.
In either case, you must first select two new files by choosing. the Open
Files... item from the Files menu. When you have selected two new files,
you must choose an item from the Differences menu in order to display
the differences between them.
To overwrite the contents of the current dxdiff window, choose the Do
Differences item from the Differences menu.
To open a new dxdiff window and preserve the current dxdiff display,
choose the Do Differences In New item from the Differences menu. The
title of the new window is maindxdiffdisplay: 1.

Exiting from dxdiff
To end the current dxdiff session, choose the Quit item from the File
menu. If you are running several dxdiff windows in the same session,
choose the Quit item in the original dxdiff window to close all of the dxdiff
windows.

Customizing dxdiff
You can customize the components of dxd iff by modifying the appropriate
entries in the .Xdefaults file in your home directory. An entry in your
.Xdefaults file must specify the application name, in this case dxdiff, the
resource name, for example textdisplay, for the text display regions, and
the value that you want the resource to be. All the name identifiers (or
specific resource names) for dxdiff are listed in the table later in this
section.
For example, to change the background color of the text regions to blue,
add the following entry:
dxdiff*textdisplay*background:

blue

To change the background color of the push button region at the bottom of
the dxdiff window, add the following entry:
dxdiff*displaymenu*background:

red

Guide to the dxdiff Visual Differences Program 9

For further details on customization, refer to dxdiff( IX) and X( IX).
The following table lists the application name identifiers for all the
customizable components of the dxdiff window.
Name Identifier

Description

dxdiffmaindisplay

The entire display, which includes all of the
components of the window

mainmenu

The main menu bar, which includes the pull-down
menus

leftfileselector

The file selection dialog box for selecting a file
to be displayed in the left text display region

rightfileselector

The file selection dialog box for selecting a file
to be displayed in the right text display region

filespulldown

The Files pull-down menu

openiIles

The Open Files button on the Files menu

The Print button on the Files menu

quit

The Quit button on the Files menu

optionspulldown

The Options pull-down menu

slavevertical

The Slave Vertical Scrolling On/Off button on the
Options menu

drawdiffs

The Display Diffs As LineslFilled Polygons button
on the Options menu

dra~inenurnnbers

The Display Line Numbers button on the Options
menu

differencespulldown

The Differences pull-down menu

dodifferences

The Do Differences button on the Differences
menu

10 Guide to the dxdiff Visual Differences Program

Name Identifier

Description

dodifferencesinnew

The Do Differences In New button on the
Differences menu

textregiondisplay

The region that includes both the left and the
right text display regions, each of which includes
the file name bars, the vertical scroll bars, the
push button region, and the text panes

diffregion

The region where the lines connecting the
differences are displayed

filenamebar

The file name bars at the top of each text
region

vscroll

The vertical scrollbars

text display

The region where the file contents are displayed

displaymenu

The push button region at the bottom of each
text display region

nextdiff

The Next Diff push button

prevdiff

The Pre v Diff push button

Guide to the dxdiff Visual Differences Program 11

How to Order Additional Documentation

Technical Support
If you need help deciding which documentation best meets your needs, call 800-343-4040

before placing your electronic, telephone, or direct mail order.

Electronic Orders
To place an order at the Electronic Store, dial 800-DEC-DEMO (800-332-3366) using a
1200- or 2400-baud modem. If you need assistance using the Electronic Store, call
800-DIGITAL (800-344-4825).

Telephone and Direct Mail Orders
Your Location

Call

Contact

Continental USA,
Alaska, or Hawaii

800-DIGITAL

Digital Equipment Corporation
P.O. Box CS2008
Nashua, New Hampshire 03061

Puerto Rico

809-754-7575

Local Digital Subsidiary

Canada

800-267-6215

Digital Equipment of Canada
Attn: DECdirect Operations KA02/2
P.O. Box 13000
100 Herzberg Road
Kanata, Ontario, Canada K2K 2A6

International
Internal*

Local Digital subsidiary or
approved distributor
SSB Order Processing - WMOJE15
or

Software Supply Business
Digital Equipment Corporation
Westminster, Massachusetts 01473

* For internal orders, you must submit an Internal Software Order Form (EN-01740-07).

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