In search of ... opinions/recommendations, ftp diff software

[barney]

Folk,

I'm looking for ftp diff software.  So far, I've found DiffVue-$20.00, Diff Commander-$29.00, Beyond Compare-$30.00, and all prices seem to be very low end, such that if I'm going to use the software to check more than one (1) site, I need to buy multiple licenses.  Nothing showed up at freecode.com, at least, nothing that I could recognize (their descriptions are not always as comprehensive as they might be  ).

That being the case, anyone here have any recommendations?

[skwire]

such that if I'm going to use the software to check more than one (1) site, I need to buy multiple licenses

I think you're confusing checking FTP sites with a "site license" which is normally purchased to cover a large amount of license for a corporate site.  In other words, the $30 license fee you pay for a personal license will allow you to check/diff however many FTP sites you want.

[barney]

You're probably right - I didn't spend much time reading the fine print. 

I was hoping to find something similar to FileZilla, but when the first three (3) hits I ran across (and several times thereafter) were commercial, and nothing showed on FreeCode, I figured my luck was out.  Since I'll prolly have to pay for the product, I seek opinions/recommendations on the better product. 

I don't mind the pay for aspect, but I don't want to sucker myself into paying for a bad product (which has happened more than once, hardware and software both  ).

[mouser]

I've found Beyond Compare to be quite wonderful.

[ewemoa]

FWIW, the following seems to have a column for FTP support:

  Other features section of "Comparison of file comparison tools"

[barney]

I've found Beyond Compare to be quite wonderful.

That's enough for me ... bought it  .

[barney]

FWIW, the following seems to have a column for FTP support:

  Other features section of "Comparison of file comparison tools"

He-he-he ... my ignorance exposed once again .  For some reason, I always forget about Wikipedia  .  Thanks.

[ewemoa]

FWIW, I noticed neither DiffVue nor Diff Commander on the Wikipedia page and they were new to me -- thanks for the research

On a related note, I got some results for Beyond Compare and DiffVue at alternativeTo:

  http://alternativeto.net/software/beyond-compare/
  http://alternativeto.net/software/diffvue/

I didn't turn up a result for Diff Commander though...

[mouser]

Just remember that feature sets don't tell the whole story.. Usually you only need a small subset of the features, and the actually usability plays a key role in finding the right tool for you -- so try your top candidates out and pick the one that best matches how you work.

[barney]

While I intend to investigate the Wikipedia files ewemoa so graciously provided, I went ahead with Beyond Compare because of mouser's accolade  .  Time constraints dictated faster action than would normally be palatable  .

Only problem I have with Beyond Compare - prolly 'cause I'm not fully conversant with it yet - is that it does not perform a text compare on the initial run.  Other than that, it works extremely well.  For me, this is the one thing that would have made FileZilla complete  .

[ewemoa]

Diff support in FileZilla does sound nice -- apparently other folks think so too:

  http://trac.filezilla-project.org/ticket/2837

[4wd]

- is that it does not perform a text compare on the initial run.

If you set the following options for the Folder Compare Saved Session, then when you compare folders it will automatically start comparing the contents:



I would suggest that for FTP sites you leave the Override quick test results option unchecked, (not like I've got), unless you have a very fast connection.