Compare Files Dialog glitch (fixed)

UltraFanatic · Jan 30, 2010#12010-01-30T12:03+00:00

Sometimes when choosing File - Compare files... I get the same filename in both the boxes for "First file" and "Second File". And I very rarely want to compare a file to itself.

Since I always press Alt+F - M - Enter quickly I don't realise it until UltraCompare has started and states "Match" even though I know there are differences between the files I intended to compare.
I can also get a file that isn't even opened in UltraEdit to appear in one of the filename boxes, but I'm pretty sure it has to have been used in a compare previously so it exists in the history lists.

Does this happen to anyone else?

I suspect it has to do with the way I sometimes do copies of my Delphi source files adding a ".old", ".older" or even ".new" extension. For example I can have files named "main.pas", "main.pas.old" and "main.pas.older" in the same folder, and it's mainly then that I've noticed it.

Mar 10, 2010#22010-03-10T10:02+00:00

I read my old post and thought I'd add some steps to reproduce the problem and probably clarify what I mean.

Create three empty files in a folder and name them "main.pas", "main.pas.old" and "main.pas.older".
Open "main.pas" and "main.pas.old" in UltraEdit
Choose File - Compare Files and do the compare
Close UltraCompare and UltraEdit
Open "main.pas.old" and "main.pas" (notice the reverse order) in UltraEdit
Choose File - Compare Files, now you have the same filename in both boxes and will compare "main.pas.old" to itself.

If you after that compare "main.pas.old" and "main.pas.older" and then later try to compare "main.pas" and "main.pas.old" you may end up comparing "main.pas.old" and "main.pas.older" even though "main.pas.older" wasn't opened in UltraEdit. It could be confusing.

Mofi · Mar 15, 2010#32010-03-15T05:59+00:00

You are right. I could reproduce this problem with following steps.

Open 2 files in UltraEdit - file A and file B - and make file A active (left one on open file tabs bar).
Click on File - Compare Files. File A is set as first file to compare and file B as second file. Correct.
Run the compare and close UltraCompare after looking on the differences.
Make now file B the active file in UltraEdit (right one on open file tabs bar, or left one after changing the open file tabs order by drag and drop).
Click again on File - Compare Files.

The active file B is set as first file to compare, but the second file to compare is also file B from previous compare instead of last file in active file history of UltraEdit which would be file A. Comparing a file with itself does not make sense.

Edited on 2010-03-23: I reported this problem today by email to IDM support. During writting the report I detected that this problem exists only when the 2 files have the same file name, to be more precise, the name of the second file includes the name of the first file completely and just the extension is different, for example when file A has the name "Test.txt" and file B has the name "Test.txt.bak". The problem does not occur when file A is "Test1.txt" and file B is "Test2.txt". I think, this is the reason why most users don't see this problem.

Edited on 2010-08-29: This special problem was fixed with UltraEdit v16.10.0.1021.