Text comparison: questions and guides
Each guide here answers one question with a practical example, then takes you to the tool to try it yourself. Guides: 11.
Questions
- How to compare two texts and find the differencesHow to compare two versions of a product description, contract or policy to see what was added, removed and changed, in Arabic and English, with a worked example.
- My supplier sent a new price list; how do I quickly see which items changed price?Paste the old and new price lists one item per line: items with a new price appear as modified pairs with the number highlighted, unchanged items stay out of the way.
- The comparison says a line changed but I can't see any difference; why?Usually a trailing space, a double space or an invisible character. How to find it, when 'ignore whitespace' is enough, and when you need to clean the text first.
- I compared two customer phone lists and numbers that are in both show up as removed and added; why?The comparison follows line order, so a number that moved looks removed in one place and added in another. Sort both lists the same way first and only new numbers remain.
- I copied the comparison result and it has lines starting with @@, + and -; how do I read it?The plain-text result of a line comparison is a unified diff. What the minus, plus and space prefixes mean and how to read the @@ line, with a price-list example.
- My new product feed has the English names in capitals; can I compare it without capitalization counting as a change?The ignore-case option makes ARABIC COFFEE and Arabic Coffee one line, so only real edits remain. Plus why the option does nothing for Arabic text.
- Is it safe to paste two versions of a confidential client contract into an online comparison tool?Our comparison runs inside your browser: neither text is uploaded or stored, and the downloaded result is created on your device. Here is what is still up to you.
- A customer's IBAN differs by one digit from the one I have on file; how do I find the digit that differs?Compare the two numbers by characters and only the digit that differs is marked, not the whole line. What to do first when one IBAN has spaces or Arabic digits.
- The comparison stopped with a message instead of a result when I compared two big files; what should I do?The comparison stops after 2.5 seconds when two large texts differ a lot, so the page never freezes. The fix is usually line comparison instead of words or characters.
- Two product descriptions look identical to me; is checking by eye enough or should I use a tool?Your eye misses a trailing period or an l in place of a 1. The comparison says identical only when every character matches, and otherwise points to the word that differs.
- Why do some edited lines show as one removed line and one added line instead of a single modification?Two lines count as one modification only when they share at least half of their words. A fully rewritten line shows as a removal and an addition. Worked examples.