Directories comparison doesn't support ignoring nodes by XPath

[gpm2a]

According to the documentation at https://www.oxygenxml.com/doc/versions/ ... -dirs.html the Compare Directories tool (labeled Diff Directories in the title bar of the tool) has this limitation: "You can use the Configure content comparison link to open the Files Comparison preferences page where you can configure options for comparing files. However, the Ignore nodes by XPath option is ignored when using the Compare Directories tool." Why?! This limitation renders the tool nearly useless for comparing directories with large numbers of XML files where you want the comparison to ignore specific nodes. After running a comparison, with the Show Only Modifications option enabled, thousands of files are shown in red as containing differences, but if you double click or hit Enter to open the Diff Files tool, many of them have no differences at all, after the specified nodes are ignored. It's not realistic to open the Diff Files tool on thousands of files. Why not add this capability to the directory comparison?

[tavy]

Hello,

Thank you for your feedback.
The comparison of directories is done in streaming mode for faster processing, which makes it challenging to implement the 'ignore by XPath' option. However, we have already have an issue in our tracker for future implementation. I have added your comment on this issue and have raised its priority.

In Oxygen 26.0 we implemented the Ignore nodes by XPath in the Generate HTML Report for Directory Comparison. See more details in the user manual: https://www.oxygenxml.com/doc/versions/ ... rison.html

Best Regards,
Octavian

[gpm2a]

Octavian,

Thank you for the explanation and for adding my comments to the existing feature request. Also, thank you very much for pointing me to the "Generate HTML Report for Directory Comparison" feature, which I had never noticed before. I think that report will be a big help in my current project, where I primarily need to identify documents with "meaningful" changes, without merging changes or using other such features of the Diff Directories and Diff Files tools.

Thanks,
Greg