RE: Tool for comparing sentences in two documents?

[Gelius Henrik <henrik -dot- gelius -at- siemens -dot- com>]

Unfortunately it's a copyrighted PDF file that I need to compare with some
Word documents. I need to check that no sentences in the copyrighted PDF
file is used in our Word files. So I don't think Track Changes in Word or
Framemaker will help me :-(    Maybe it's time to write a PERL script that
does the job on textfiles instead...

//henrik




-----Original Message-----
From: Hart, Geoff [mailto:Geoff-H -at- mtl -dot- feric -dot- ca]
Sent: den 8 november 2002 15:41
To: Techwr-L (E-mail); Gelius Henrik
Subject: Tool for comparing sentences in two documents?


Gelius Henrik wonders: <<I need to compare two documents (plain text is
fine) on a sentence level, to check what original sentences in document1 are
present in document2.  Have anyone seen such a tool, please?>>

If you're able to work in Word, it has a reasonably good document comparison
utility. With Doc2 open, open the Tools menu and select Track Changes, then
Compare Documents. You can then select Doc1, and in the current document,
Word will use its Track Changes features to highlight the differences
between the two documents. There are undoubtedly better (dedicated) tools
available for doing this, but the free tool you already have is often good
enough for most purposes.

If you have the chance to plan this comparison right from the beginning
(e.g., your documentation group is updating an old Word document to match a
new release of software), a more effective approach is to ask the authors to
use Track Changes during their first efforts at revising the document. This
lets you see the initial changes quickly and easily, and decide whether to
continue reviewing changes in this manner throughout the remainder of the
revision cycle.

--Geoff Hart, geoff-h -at- mtl -dot- feric -dot- ca
Forest Engineering Research Institute of Canada
580 boul. St-Jean
Pointe-Claire, Que., H9R 3J9 Canada 
"User's advocate" online monthly at
www.raycomm.com/techwhirl/usersadvocate.html
Hofstadter's Law--"The time and effort required to complete a project are
always more than you expect, even when you take into account Hofstadter's
Law."


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