Tool WinMerge - a very useful tool for Renpy, etc. modders

OhWee

Forum Fanatic
Modder
Game Developer
Jun 17, 2017
5,890
29,935
Hey!

For those of you that like to modify text-based scripts in games, there's a tool I use extensively for this when updating my mods to the latest version of a game.

WinMerge


It's a 'differences comparison' tool that allows you to compare two text or text-like files side by side. It highlights the changes between the two versions, and allows you to copy changes over, individually or en masse, and/or edit either file directly.

Then you can save either or both files (left, right) once you've finished your comparison.

It can even generate a 'report' file that highlights the differences between the two files, in .html format (maybe other formats too), so that you can show others what the changes are. This can be useful if someone wants to know what exactly you've changed in your version of a file...

As a Renpy modder, I use this tool a LOT when looking for changes between .rpy scripts. Say to see what a developer might have changed between versions of a game, so that I can study the changes and decide how best to proceed.

And, it works for a number of text-based file formats.

There are other tools that do this as well. WinMerge is free and open source.

I highly recommend this tool!
:frown:
 

Palanto

Active Member
Game Developer
Oct 4, 2017
964
1,841
perfect, I used diffchecker.com for that so far... didn't search for an offline version (and didn't want to edit notepad++ to do the same ;D )
 
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Elementario

Member
Game Developer
Nov 11, 2017
252
312
Hey!

For those of you that like to modify text-based scripts in games, there's a tool I use extensively for this when updating my mods to the latest version of a game.

WinMerge


It's a 'differences comparison' tool that allows you to compare two text or text-like files side by side. It highlights the changes between the two versions, and allows you to copy changes over, individually or en masse, and/or edit either file directly.

Then you can save either or both files (left, right) once you've finished your comparison.

It can even generate a 'report' file that highlights the differences between the two files, in .html format (maybe other formats too), so that you can show others what the changes are. This can be useful if someone wants to know what exactly you've changed in your version of a file...

As a Renpy modder, I use this tool a LOT when looking for changes between .rpy scripts. Say to see what a developer might have changed between versions of a game, so that I can study the changes and decide how best to proceed.

And, it works for a number of text-based file formats.

There are other tools that do this as well. WinMerge is free and open source.

I highly recommend this tool!
:frown:
Thanks!
Really useful tool and easy to use
 

DamnVamMan

Member
Mar 14, 2017
302
364
save yourself the clutter and just get a diff tool for your text editor. ST, ATOM, VSC all have RenPy plugins and many different diff tools.

So why not add:
  • Syntax highlighting
  • Auto-completions
  • Auto-indentation
  • Auto tab replacement
  • Method snippets





If you don't know about ATOM's RenPy support you need to read better or update your Ren'Py SDK...