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90 lines
4.1 KiB
ReStructuredText
90 lines
4.1 KiB
ReStructuredText
.. _diff:
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Comparing E-books
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========================
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calibre includes an integrated e-book comparison tool that can be used to see
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what has changed inside an ebook after editing or converting it. It can compare
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books in the EPUB and AZW3 formats.
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To use it, either open the ebook in the tool for :ref:`edit` and then click
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:guilabel:`File->Compare to other book` or use the :ref:`book_details` panel.
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If you do a conversion from EPUB to EPUB, the original EPUB file will be saved
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as ORIGINAL_EPUB. Simply right click on the ORIGINAL_EPUB entry in the Book
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Details panel and choose :guilabel:`Compare to EPUB format`.
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The comparison tool that opens will look like the screenshot below. It shows
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you the differences in text, styles and images in the chosen books.
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.. image:: images/diff.png
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:alt: The compare tool
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:align: center
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:class: fit-img
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Understanding the comparison view
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----------------------------------
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As can be seen in the screenshot above, the comparison view shows the
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differences between the two books side by side. Only the differences, with a
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few lines of context around them are shown. This makes it easy to see at a
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glance only what was changed inside a large document like a book.
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Added text is shown with a green background, removed text with a red background
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and changed text with a blue background.
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The line numbers of all changed text are show at the sides, making it easy to
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go to a particular change in the editor. When you open the comparison tool from
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within the editor, you can also double click on a line in the right panel to
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go to that line in the editor automatically.
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One useful technique when comparing books is to tell the comparison tool to
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beautify the text and style files before calculating differences. This can
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often result in cleaner and easier to follow differences. To do this, click the
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:guilabel:`Options` button in the bottom right and choose :guilabel:`Beautify
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files before comparing`. Note that beautifying can sometimes have undesired
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effects, as it can cause invalid markup to be altered to make it valid. You can
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also change the number of lines of context shown around differences via the
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:guilabel:`Options` button.
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You can search for any text in the differences via the search bar at the
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bottom. You will need to specify which panel to search, the :guilabel:`Left` or
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the :guilabel:`Right`.
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How to launch the comparison tool
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-----------------------------------
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The comparison tool is most useful when you have two versions of the same book
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and you want to see what is different between them. To that end, there are
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several ways to launch the tool.
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Comparing two ebook files
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^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
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Open the first file in the :ref:`edit` tool. Now click :guilabel:`File->Compare
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to another book` and choose the second file (it must be in the same format as
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the first). The comparison view will open with the file being edited on the
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right and the second file on the left.
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Comparing the ORIGINAL_FMT to FMT
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^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
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When you do a conversion in calibre from a FMT to itself, the original file is
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saved as ORIGINAL_FMT. You can see what was changed by the conversion, by right
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clicking on the ORIGINAL_FMT entry in the :ref:`book_details` panel in the main
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calibre window and selecting :guilabel:`Compare to FMT`. The comparison view will
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open with ORIGINAL_FMT on the left and FMT on the right.
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Comparing a checkpoint to the current state of the book while editing
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^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
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The :ref:`edit` tool has a very useful feature, called :ref:`checkpoints`. This
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allows you to save the current state of the book as a named
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*checkpoint*, to which you can revert if you do not like the changes you have
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made since creating the checkpoint. Checkpoints are also created automatically
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when you perform various automated actions in the editor. You can see the list
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of checkpoints by going to :guilabel:`View->Checkpoints` and then use the
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:guilabel:`Compare` button to compare the book at the selected checkpoint with
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the current state. The comparison tool will show the checkpoint on the left and
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the current state on the right.
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