Skip to main content
Varinder_Saini
Adobe Employee
Varinder_Saini
Adobe Employee
December 12, 2016
Question

Compare Files - Acrobat

  • December 12, 2016
  • 1 reply
  • 5085 views

Reviewing and comparing documents can take forever, especially when multiple people are involved in the process. Consider the scenario: You receive a new version of the press release you’ve been working on from your PR Agency. Press release is due tomorrow. So, now you have the mammoth task of comparing it to the previous version to identify all the changes. Any change gone unnoticed could pose huge legal and reputation risk. When deadlines are looming, finding and reviewing a few small changes in a 30-page document can be a frustrating experience!

This is where Acrobat DC's  new “Compare Files” feature comes handy. With the all-new Compare Files tool, you can now quickly and accurately detect differences between two versions of a PDF file. You can find more information at :

Compare two versions of a PDF file in Adobe Acrobat.

Compare two versions of a PDF: Tips and tricks | Adobe Content Corner

Thanks

Varinder

This topic has been closed for replies.

1 reply

L
Community Expert
LaubenderCommunity Expert
Community Expert
December 12, 2016

Hi Varinder,

two observations on comparing two related PDFs with "Compare Text":

1. It would be cool if Acrobat's "Compare Text" feature could do single comparisons on "paragraph basis".
I found, that often the smallest unit of a single "comparison" is made accross the border of a single paragraph.

Or is a feature there where I can control this?
E.g. Let a single paragraph sign be the border of a single "comparison".

2. If text is hyphenated differently—the compared text is running in text frames of different width—but otherwise the text is all the same, Acrobat will highlight a difference. The result is a false positive, so to say.

Note: Just did some first "baby steps" using "Compare Files".

Regards,
Uwe

    Varinder_Saini
    Adobe Employee
    Varinder_SainiAuthor
    Adobe Employee
    December 12, 2016

    Thanks Uwe for the feedback. We are aware of the hyphenated scenario. But is it really a false positive? I understand the text is same but from rendering or printing perspective there is actually a diff.

    Keep providing the feedback

    Thanks

    Varinder

    L
    Community Expert
    LaubenderCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    December 12, 2016

    Thanks, Varinder.
    Now the problem with the "false positive" is showing a basic problem with comparing text.
    You opened this thread in the InDesign forum. So let's discuss this in an InDesign related perspective.

    In my example the user made a change in layout.
    Not a change in "contents" when we see "unformatted" text as "contents" of a text frame.


    No character was added, no character was removed. The hyphen was created automatically by InDesign's composer applied to the paragraph. If I'd compare the text on a string by string bases out of InDesign, I would see no difference.

    On the Acrobat's side Acrobat is not able to see hyphenated text other than text where hyphens are added as characters.
    And that's only naturally: The hyphen is "rendered" as true character by exporting the text frame to PDF. in InDesign we have no access to the hyphen itself. We cannot select it.

    This is something like a dichotomy and cannot be solved.

    Two strategies with this:

    1. On the InDesign side

    The code for doing hyphens could perhaps be rewritten within InDesign's text feature and the hyphen done with hyphenation can be not only seen as a special character internally, but also would be exported as something like a special character or as a character with an annotation perhaps to hand over its meaning to a PDF. It's very unlikely, that this would happen in the near future, I think.

    2. On the Acrobat side

    Acrobat's "Compare Text" feature should be enhanced to gather the "meaning" of hyphen characters when detected at the end of a line. For now we have to live with the problem, I think.

    Btw. If the "Read Aloud" feature of Acrobat would read the two examples, I think it would not stumble over the fact, that the one word is hyphenated and the other one is not.

    Regards,
    Uwe

    Terms & ConditionsAccessibility statement
    Using the community Terms of use Privacy Cookie preferences Do not sell or share my personal information ad choicesAdChoices