This is a small command line script that will compare two files using Microsoft Word file comparison tool. Microsoft Word will be started using COM automation.
It is useful as a diff tool for Word-related file types.
To run the script, execute it through PowerShell like this:
$ powershell -File Diff-Word.ps1 oldfile.docx newfile.docxOr via the batch file:
$ diff-word.cmd oldfile.docx newfile.docx
To run the GUI form, run the script start-gui.cmd: it will open a form that stays on top of all the system windows,
and you can drag files from Windows Explorer to two text fields
(first for the old document, and second for the revised document).
When you click the Compare button, it will start Word application with chosen documents as in command line usage,
and the form will lose the "stay on top of all windows" behavior.
It will regain this property again after the button Clear is clicked.
If you drop multiple files into either box, then the first element will be placed in the box where files are dropped, and the second one into the other box.
You can also use this tool with git, so that git diff will use Microsoft Word
to diff *.docx files.
To do this, you must configure your .gitattributes and .gitconfig to support
a custom diff tool.
To configure your .gitattributes, open or create a file called
.gitattributes in your git repo's root directory. Add the following text to a
new line in this file:
*.docx diff=word
It is also possible to create a global .gitattributes file that will be
applied to every repository in a system. To do that, create a file
.gitattributes in your home directory, and then perform the following command:
git config --global core.attributesfile ~/.gitattributesTo configure your .gitconfig, open or create the file in your home directory.
Then, add the following to your .gitconfig:
[diff "word"] command = <pathToExtDiffFolder>/diff-word-wrapper.cmd
Replace <pathToExtDiffFolder> with the path to this repo's
location on disk.
Idea taken from TortoiseSVN diff-doc script.