Merge Files with Change Tracking Highlights

Attention: This script is bundled with the all platforms distribution of Oxygen XML Author Eclipse plugin. To run the script, you are required to purchase a special scripting commercial license.

The Merge Files with Change Tracking Highlights script (mergeFilesTrackChanges.sh, found in the scripts subfolder inside Oxygen's installation directory) can be used to merge 2 XML files (based on a 2-way comparison). The Author mode comparison results are saved as documents with highlighted tracked changes that can later be reviewed and accepted or rejected.

Notice: This script is intended to be used for merging XML documents (Oxygen XML Author Eclipse plugin creates change tracking markers only for XML file types. Using this script for document types other than XML, or for documents that are not XML well-formed, causes document parsing errors and the merge operation fails.

Arguments for the Merge Files with Change Tracking Highlights Script

sh mergeFilesTrackChanges.sh pathOfBaseFile pathOfFileToMergeWith [[pathOfOutFile] [-nb noBackupOfBaseFile]] [-help | --help | -h | --h]

pathOfBaseFile: Mandatory argument that specifies the path of the base file (it can also be provided as a URL).
pathOfFileToMergeWith: Mandatory argument that specifies the file to merge with (it can also be provided as a URL).
pathOfOutFile: Optional argument that specifies the path of the file where the merge operation results are saved to (it can also be provided as a URL). If present, it must appear immediately after the first two mandatory arguments. If absent, the merge results are saved to the base file, by overwriting it. You cannot choose the same file specified as the file to merge with as the output file (the merge process is aborted in this case). Also, if the output is a remote resource, its entire parent directory structure must already exist. Otherwise, an I/O exception is thrown and the merge results cannot be saved.
-nb noBackupOfBaseFile: Set to true if you do not want a backup copy of the base file on the hard disk. There are 2 situations when a backup of the base file is performed automatically and the backup operation must succeed to proceed with the merge. Otherwise, the merge process is aborted if the output file is not specified (i.e. the pathOfOutFile argument is not present) or the specified output file is the base file itself.

The backup copy will have the same parent directory as the base directory and its name will be the name of the base file suffixed by ".OXY.BAK". The default value is false, which means that for either of the 2 previously mentioned situations, a backup copy of the base file will be kept on the hard disk.
Note: The backup copy can be deleted only if the base file and, implicitly, its backup copy are local resources (not remote).
-help | --help | -h | --h: Displays help text.

Note: For boolean arguments, it is not necessary to provide the "true" value. Their presence in the argument list is equivalent to setting their value to "true" (and their absence from the argument list is equivalent to setting their value to "false"). However, constructs of the form bool_option true|false are accepted and interpreted accordingly

Examples of Compare Files Script

Example 1: Compare Files and View Results in XML Format

The following command results in merging file1 and file2 into outfile with changes highlighted:

sh scripts/mergeFilesTrackChanges.sh file1 file2 outfile

Example 2: Compare Files with Line by Line Algorithm

The following command results in merging file1 and file2 by overwriting file1. However, the file1 is backed up first:

sh scripts/mergeFilesTrackChanges.sh file1 file2

Example 3: Compare Files and Generate Comparison Report

The following command results in merging file1 and file2 by overwriting file1. Although file1 is initially backed up, the backup is eventually removed:

sh scripts/mergeFilesTrackChanges.sh file1 file2 -nb