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TextMaestro offers a simple yet powerful diff and
merge facility. By nature, any diff logic is straight forward (commonly
using Longest Common Subsequence (LCS) algorithm), while merge logic is
complex. Even with a state of the art analysis, a merge algorithm may
become fallacious, and thereby require manual intervention. With that
in mind, TextMaestro leaves most of the merging on user's acceptance and
offers a set of comfortable features to complete the mission. The diff-and-merge
of TextMaestro is designed for the most complicated merging efforts that
one might encounter. Yet its simplicity appeals to commonplace usage.
Quick Tips:
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When you want to diff between two blocks
of text in a hurry, simply put the two blocks on Input
window and Output
window and hit Alt+1.
Alternatively, use this button from the File
Diff Manager. |
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When
you want to diff two files, simply select the two files in the main list,
and hit Alt+2.
Alternatively,
use this button
from the File Diff Manager. |
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When you want to do 3-way merge, simply
select the three files in the main list, and hit Alt+3.
Alternatively,
use this button
from the File Diff Manager. |
Below is a simple demo
on how to use 3-way merge feature.
Suppose we have three files, where one is the parent
and the rest are descendants. Assume the following as the contents of
the three files:
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file-1.txt |
file-2.txt |
file-3.txt |
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1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14. |
1
12
123
1234
12345
123456
-<Yr 01>-
1234567
12345678
123456789
1234567890
2222222222
2222222222
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1
12
123
1234
12345
123456
-<Year 2001>-
1234567
12345678
123456789
1234567890
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1
12
123
33333333333
33333333333
1234
12345
123456
1234567
12345678
123456789
1234567890
3333333333
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In addition, assume the
following time-line on file modifications:
That is to say, File 2 and File 3 were modified independent
of each other. They were however derived from File 1 and now we want to
merge both sets of changes:
Changes
between File 1 and 2, {1-2} Changes
between File 1 and 3, {1-3}
A merge task like this is called three-way
merge. Here we show step by step how to accomplish it in TextMaestro. |
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(1) Launch the application.
(2) Drag the three files that we want to merge onto
the main list as shown here.
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(3) Select the three files, if they are not selected.
Then select Diff-n-Merge
button (Alt+D)
from the Session toolbar as shown below:
This will open the dialog below:
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(4) Click
on the 3-Way diff button. The 3-Way
Diff pane will appear as shown
below:
On the 3-Way
Diff window, the first selected file is placed in the middle, second
on the left, and third on the right, i.e., in the order of {2,
1, 3}. (See above).
(5) Click on Display
palette for Master file  button. The following
will appear:
Now is the time to make a critical decision.
We need to decide which of the three files to be loaded here. Often this
decision depends on two things:
Sometimes you may minimize the merging tasks by adopting
a variant which has the most difference against the parent. But that might
not be always the right thing to do. For example, your high priority variant
may have very small changes, but taking the most 'noisy' variant as master
copy may break your high priority one. Therefore, if you do have a high
priority variant, take that as master copy and bring in all other variants'
changes into it upon scrutiny.
When you do not know which variant is of
the highest priority, it becomes tedious to decide which changes should
be honored and which discarded. Such cases are commonly called conflicts.
Almost always the user has to review the differences and resolve these
conflicts one by one.
After initial review of the variants, we
decided to load variant 1, i.e., file-1.txt into the Master
File palette as shown below:
Let us now bring in the differences exposed
on the right hand side of the 3-Way
Diff window. We somehow concluded that line 4 and 5 are rightful
candidates to be brought into Master
File palette, while line 13 is not.
So, we drag
and drop line 4 and 5 onto Master
File palette in the right location,
and it appears like this:
The icon  implies that these lines
came from variant 3.
Next, we bring in differences exposed on
the left hand side of the 3-Way
Diff window. Note, line 7 of left window should replace line 9
of Master File
palette.
So, we hold
down the control key, and drag line 7 from left window, and drop
it onto Master File
palette at line 9. Note,
holding down the control key while dragging makes it an override mode.
Otherwise, it is an addition mode.
This is how Master
File palette appears:
The icon  implies that this line came from variant 2, and it replaced
the existing line in here.
If you were to edit a certain line here, simply double
click on it and this dialog will appear, with a new line shown as an example:
When you add new lines in this edit pad, they will
be added to the Master
File palette. Hit OK. You will see the following:
The icon  implies that this line came
from the edit pad, manually added by the user.
At this stage, you may choose to save the palette
to a file. Click on  button and follow the steps. The
file will be saved and listed on the main list under current selection.
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That is it, unless you decide to check out the difference
between one of the variants and the final copy.
If so, simply click the
variant and the final copy, and hit on Quick
Diff button from the File
Diff Manager, or hit (Alt+2).
Here is an example of a quick diff between variant 2 and the final copy.
You
can use quick diff any time. Every
time you hit Quick Diff
button, the last one is discarded and a new one is built. That way, your
intermediate changes are captured. However,
make sure you save the Master
File palette to propagate the changes into the diff. In other words,
the diff engine picks up information from the file, not from Master
File palette. |
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Quick
Diff between File 2 and the merged file:
Comment:
Along with drag
and drop, you also have choice of pop up menus by clicking on right mouse
button on Diff panes, and also on Master
File palette. They are sometimes helpful when you are working with
extremely large file, and want to avoid tedious scrolling.
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Popup menu from Diff windows: |
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Popup menu from Master File palette: |
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Use of Down  and Up  arrow
to jump to variant differences is handy when you have very large file
to work with. It avoids eye-balling and scrolling, and reduces chances
of missing out difference instances. Using Find
text in Master palette  button you can search for
certain text in the Master palette. When you do not know the line number,
but have some idea about the text, this becomes life-saver. You can perform
similar search in the diff lists, simply by double-clicking on a line. Double-clicking
on diff list opens Find
Text dialog. Double-clicking on Master
File palette, opens Edit
Master Palette dialog. There are various
bells-and-whistles on Master
File palette, and we leave them for you to explore. As part of the
performance testing, we tried files of 250K lines and the responses were
reasonable.
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