Comparing two .reg files.

[Prabh]

Hi all,
I want to see the changes made to my Registry after install an app.
So,
1. I took a snapshot of my Registry in Before.reg.
2. Installed the app.
3. Took another snapshot, After.reg.

I'm trying to compare the two .reg files using Windiff.
Its says the two files differ only in blanks. I know thats not true.
I have no idea why its saying that.

Are there any other tools which can compare two .reg files?

Thanks for your time,
Prab

 

[Mark V]

Hi all,
I want to see the changes made to my Registry after install an app.
So,
1. I took a snapshot of my Registry in Before.reg.
2. Installed the app.
3. Took another snapshot, After.reg.

I'm trying to compare the two .reg files using Windiff.
Its says the two files differ only in blanks. I know thats not true.
I have no idea why its saying that.

Are there any other tools which can compare two .reg files?

Not your question, but I'd recommend an Installation Tracking Utility
for the task instead. The free InCtrl5 may still be available
somewhere or one of these perhaps:
http://lists.gpick.com/pages/Install~Uninstall_Tools.htm
Total Uninstall has been frequently praised by many.

Or for some purposes using a Registry Monitor (real-time) such as
REGMON from Sysinternals may be useful when a limited number of
registry changes.

For the original question what is "snapshot"? A Regedit4/5-formated
"Export"? "Exporting" more than a key or sub-branch is not very
practical. "Export" is never suitable for registry backup purposes.

 

[Igor Green]

Hello,
The problem is registry exports are unicode in Win2K and higher, and
WinDiff does not work correctly with Unicode. You can have a look at
our Compare It! tool from http://www.grigsoft.com/wincmp3.htm.
As an example, here is our comaparison chart with WinDiff:
http://www.grigsoft.com/windiff.htm

Igor Green
http://www.grigsoft.com
Compare It! + Synchronize It! : Files and folders comparison never was
easier!

 

[Mark V]

Hello,
The problem is registry exports are unicode in Win2K and higher,

Only by default in regedit.exe "5" though. One can select output to be
ANSI ("REGEDIT4" format), use REG.EXE, or many other registry tools
default to "4" format. Or the regedit.exe from NT4 will do.

and WinDiff does not work correctly with Unicode. You can have a
look at our Compare It! tool from
http://www.grigsoft.com/wincmp3.htm. As an example, here is our

I'll bookmark that against future need.

 

[Jerold Schulman]

Hi all,
I want to see the changes made to my Registry after install an app.
So,
1. I took a snapshot of my Registry in Before.reg.
2. Installed the app.
3. Took another snapshot, After.reg.

I'm trying to compare the two .reg files using Windiff.
Its says the two files differ only in blanks. I know thats not true.
I have no idea why its saying that.

Are there any other tools which can compare two .reg files?

Thanks for your time,
Prab

You can select Win9x / NT4 Registration file for the drop-down list
to get plain text and then use windiff.

or you can use the command line to export it:

See tip 2750 in the 'Tips & Tricks' at http://www.jsiinc.com


Jerold Schulman
Windows: General MVP
JSI, Inc.
http://www.jsiinc.com

 

[condonethis]

WinPuurg

I use WinMerge but I have built an application to convert WinMerge patch files to .reg format. It works great for non-M$ apps, but since WinMerge doesn't maintain HK in generated patch files, mostly just for install/uninstall uses. I had one application in particular that I couldn't install on x64 Win7, but I knew it worked. I exported entire reg to file1, installed, exported entire changed reg to file2. Make a comparison patch with WinMerge then used my application to clean up all the unecessary content. This leaves you with an actual .reg file you can use on other machines, without having to manually edit 100s of lines of text.

http://condonethis.com/media/vb/winpuurg.html