1.1.
Does WinMerge run on older Windows versions?
Beginning with Version 2.14, WinMerge ended support for older 32-bit Windows systems, including Windows 9x, ME, and NT4. In addition, WinMerge version 2.16 does not support Windows 2000.
Previously, WinMerge provided an ANSI (8-bit) executable, WinMerge.exe, that was designed around the old Windows codepages. WinMerge.exe internally stored only the ANSI characters supported by the Windows codepage. This executable had severe limitations for working with Unicode: if you opened a Unicode file, the characters were converted to the Windows ANSI codepage. Because there are over 100,000 Unicode characters, and only 256 can be represented in the ANSI character set, data loss could occur. Conversion might be approximate (for example, accents are lost) or impossible: characters were replaced by question marks ( ? ).
WinMerge.exe also could not open files with names outside the current ANSI codepage. For example, on an English system, WinMerge.exe could not open a file with a Hebrew name.
WinMerge developed the Unicode-enabled WinMergeU.exe executable to work with newer, Unicode-based Windows systems. WinMergeU.exe has none of the limitations of the ANSI executable.
WinMergeU.exe has been installed by default for some time, and since few ANSI-based Windows systems remain, the value of maintaining WinMerge.exe is minimal. As of Version 2.14, WinMerge no longer includes WinMerge.exe in the installer.
1.2.
I want to compare folders, but I cannot select a folder in the Browse dialog.
Browse in the folder contents to the folder you want to compare. Do not select any of the files or subfolders, just click Open when Folder Selection is displayed in the File name field. If you already selected a files or subfolders, just type a random string in the File name field and click Open. If the file name you enter is not found, WinMerge opens the folder.
1.3.
Do you have any plans to support other operating systems besides Windows?
There are currently no plans for cross-platform support but you can try the unofficial version WinMerge 2011 by Jochen Neubeck. This version should work with Wine also under Linux.
1.4.
Providing an integration with CVS is of questionable value because there already are so many good CVS clients. However, WinMerge does provide an integration with the diff function of one of those clients, TortoiseCVS (as described in Using WinMerge with other tools). Also, WinMerge can resolve conflict files (see Resolving conflict files).
1.5.
MRU is an abbreviation for “Most Recently Used”, and refers to the history lists in the Select Files or Folders dialog. The list contain the last twenty paths used on each side.
1.6.
OpenOffice files are archives. To be able to open them in WinMerge, you have to configure archive support:
In WinMerge, click the Options button (or click Edit → Options). In the Archive Support page, enable the Detect archive type from file signature option
1.7.
Why do large files sometimes show up as different in the Folder Compare window, but identical in the File Compare window?
This is because WinMerge always uses the Quick Contents file compare method for large files. This method enables WinMerge to compare large files more efficiently. To test if this is causing the behavior you're seeing, you can try raising the Quick Contents threshold for large files. See the discussion of this method in Starting a folder compare operation to learn how.
