WinMerge as a Comparison Tool in Visual Studio 2008

Wednesday, December 16, 2009

Ok I know VS 2010 is the new toy to be seen playing around with, but as I have just recently got delivery of my new Windows 7 pc I thought I would document how to get WinMerge to work as a comparison tool with VS2008 Team System. If for anything, so I know myself when the time comes to do it all over again.

Team Foundation Server does have a built in comparison and merge tool, but personally I find WinMerge to be far better. Oh and it is free.

After downloading and installing, you need to configure Visual Studio. Go to Tools >> Options
Find the ‘Source Control’ section in the tree view and select ‘Visual Studio Team Foundation Server’
Click the ‘Configure User Tools’ button.
Click on the ‘Add’ button on the ‘Configure User Tools’ window.
Enter these values in the textboxes:

Extension: *
Operation: Compare
Command: C:\Program Files\WinMerge\WinMergeU.exe (or wherever you have installed WinMerge to)
Arguments: /x /e /ub /wl /dl %6 /dr %7 %1 %2
Click OK all the way back down to get back to the main IDE.

Now when you view a file history from Solution Explorer it will start up WinMerge.

7 Comments

Since WinMerge can compare directories, it is also a good deployment tool.

Point it at the development directory and the deployment directory and you can see which files have been modified. You can then compare and optionally copy the files to the deployment directory.

SGWellens - Wednesday, December 16, 2009 4:06:38 PM

@SGWellens - That is great, I didn't even know it could do that. Thanks.

Garry Pilkington - Wednesday, December 16, 2009 4:43:04 PM

How well does it handle resx and proj (xml) files?

Can it merge resx when two people have each added a resource entry or added a file to the proj?

AndrewSeven - Wednesday, December 16, 2009 11:17:55 PM

You can also use it for merging which is where it gets really powerful.

Check out http://www.neovolve.com/post/2007/06/19/using-winmerge-with-tfs.aspx

Rory Primrose - Thursday, December 17, 2009 12:06:25 AM

Forgot to mention, my post also has a reg file that will configure all this for you.

Rory Primrose - Thursday, December 17, 2009 12:09:32 AM

@primrose - Thanks for the pointer Rory.

Garry Pilkington - Thursday, December 17, 2009 8:46:59 AM

Yeah, it happens sometimes ... Nothing special.

Anna - Tuesday, March 27, 2012 10:44:56 AM

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