Software Update: Beyond Compare 4.0.0 build 18262 beta

Scooter Software has released a new beta release of version 4.0 of Beyond Compare. This very extensive program, which is available for Windows, Linux and now also for OS X, allows files to be compared. In addition, it is possible to compare complete folders, ftp locations and archives. Beyond Compare is available in a standard and a pro version, for Prices that start at $30. The mutual differences can be this page are being found. The main changes in version 4.0 can be this page found, this is the changelog for this release:

Notable Changes

• Picture Compare now compares alpha channels, supports JPEG XR and third-party WIC decoders on Windows, supports JPEG 2000, Photoshop, and raw camera formats on OS X, and has significantly improved speed, memory usage, and file format compatibility.
• Added ability to pause file operations in the folder compare.
• Expanded and updated help.
• Scripting “FOLDER-REPORT” now accepts an “INCLUDE-FILE-LINKS” argument and “CRITERIA” accepts an “IGNORE-UNIMPORTANT” argument.
• Windows: Added “Copy creation dates” folder compare/sync setting for local->local copies.

Amazon S3

• Fixed Amazon S3 progress reporting so it’s updated more often than every 4MBs.

Command Line

• OS X: Fixed installing command line tools when ‘mkdir’ and ‘ln’ aren’t in the path. (Mantis 4746)
• OS X: Fixed behavior when launching from a sudo command line or when using the -solo switch.
• Windows: Fixed /? command line switch

File Formats

• Added *.dbf to “MS Excel Workbooks” format. (Mantis 1103)

File Views

• Fixed “Open/Save File Using Profile” handling of local paths. (Mantis 4872)
• OS X: Fixed missing beep when searching for text or the next difference fails.

Folder Compare

• Added ability to pause running file operations.
• Windows: Added “Copy creation dates” setting for local->local copies.
• OS X: Fixed file filters combobox to display the names of preset filters.
• OS X: Browse dialog’s “Favorites” and “Devices” nodes now update the root of the display on the right panel.
• OS X: Fixed browse dialog’s support for filenames containing apostrophes. (Mantis 4806)
• Double clicking a profile name in the folder browse dialog now launches that as a base folder. (Mantis 4770)

Folder Merge

• Added cue to indicate which path edit should have the ancestor file for 3-way merges. (Mantis 4821)
• Fixed displaying proposed merge action for deleted files.

Folder Sync

• Added “Copy Creation Dates” option.
• Improved interface layout to take up less vertical space.
• Fixed slow performance when changing sync type. (Mantis 4651)

FTP

• Importing BC3 SFTP profiles with saved blank passwords now clears them to improve behavior when using a key pair. (Mantis 4789)
• Fixed unresponsiveness when deleting cached files.

Hex Compare

• Fixed deleting bytes in the hex editor when positioned after the last one. (Mantis 4798)

Home View

• Using Ctrl+F/Cmd+F now sets focus to the session treeview’s search edit.
• Fixed [Ins] shortcut so it only adds a session if the session list has focus.

Installer

• Windows: Removed “Add to Quick Launch” option in installer on Windows 7 and above.
• OS X: Fixed moving “Beyond Compare.app” to the Applications folder so it will use /Applications instead of ~/Applications if an existing copy is already stored there. (Mantis 4793)
• Linux: Fixed “Check for Updates” handling of i386 and amd64 .deb packages. (Mantis 4830)

misc

• Updated Help
• Windows: Added support for drag & drop to open comparisons of UNC servers and MTP files and folders. (Mantis 4792).
• Windows: Menu/tab gradients are now disabled when using the “Windows Classic” theme. (Mantis 4790)
• Windows Fixed various scaling issues on high DPI displays.
• Windows: Fixed toolbar appearance when the system menu font and dialog font are different. (Mantis 4873)
• Linux: Fixed session treeview button background painting.
• OS X: Fixed dialogs that were taller than they needed to be and extended below the dock (folder browse, Profiles manager, and File Formats manager). (Mantis 4805)
• OS X: Fixed windows being opened off screen if the saved position collided with an existing window. (Mantis 4802)
• Fixed “Restore Factory Defaults” so it doesn’t show items in red.

Options

• Added “Move Up” [Ctrl+Up] and “Move Down” [Ctrl+Down] shortcuts to rearrange lists.
• using [F2] in the Options “Open With” grid will now edit the selected item.

Picture Compare

• The alpha channel for transparent images is now compared along with the RGB values ​​and shown in the zoomed details display with crosshaching.
• Significantly improved comparison speed, memory usage, and user interface responsiveness.
• Windows: Added support for JPEG XR images (.jxr;.wdp)
• Windows: Added support for third party Windows Imaging Component (WIC) decoders (eg, WebP).
• OS X: Added support for Photoshop .psd, Adobe .pdf (first page only), and any camera RAW formats supported by the operating system.
• “Picture Files” mask now only includes the most popular types by default. Remaining extensions are matched implicitly as part of the Picture Compare “Everything Else” file format.
• Reverted offset behavior so there is only a single pair of offset values ​​again, rather than separate ones for the left and right side.
• Right image is no longer clipped if it’s above/left of the left image.
• Comparison offset no longer affects the display of the input images.
• Darked checkerboarding for transparent images so bright glows show up better.
• Inverted blend percentages so 0% shows the left image and 100% shows the right.
• Added “Blend Toggle” command [F8] that switches between 0% and 100%.
• Removed “Background” color and “Show transparency as checkerboarding” options.
• Using the mouse wheel while the “Zoom” trackbar has focus will use the same zoom logic as everywhere else.
• Windows: Improved .ico support for alpha transparency, PNG-encoded images, and images larger than 256×256.
• Fixed incompatibilities with various JPEG images. (Mantis 3782, 4025)
• Fixed compatibility issues with PNG and TIFF images and threading issues with GIF images.
• Windows: Fixed crash when loading .TIF images and 8-bit .PCX images. (Mantis 4696)
• OS X: Inaccurate bit per pixel values ​​are no longer shown.
• Fixed mouse cursor flicker when adjusting comparison values ​​(blend percent, etc).
• OS X: Fixed partially transparent pixels being drawn too darkly and showing the wrong RGB values.
• OS X: Fixed blurry zoomed details.
• Linux: Fixed zoomed details never appearing.
• Windows: Fixed flicker when drawing the details.
• Fixed dropping files on the right or center panel to load on the appropriate side.
• Fixed input images flickering when changing comparison options like the compare mode or blend percentage.

Registry Compare

• Improved performance issues when drawing extremely long multi-string registry values.

Reports

• Text Patch Report now follows the “Compare line endings” session setting and produces patches with appropriate line endings.
• Picture Compare report now generates monochrome image as 8-bit images instead of 24-bit ones.

scripting

• Added “INCLUDE-FILE-LINKS” parameter to “FOLDER-REPORT” command.
• Added “IGNORE-UNIMPORTANT” parameter to “CRITERIA” command. (Mantis 1226)
• Significantly improved comparison and “Resize cells to fit” speed.
• Fixed support for comparing Excel dates with different formats. (Mantis 3410)
• Fixed support for non-ASCII delimiters. (Mantis 3992)
• Fixed displaying hints for very large cells.
• Fixed support for very large cells in reports. (Mantis 4724)
• Removed “Decimal separator” setting and fixed MS Excel conversion to handle decimal separators correctly. (Mantis 4831).

Text Compare

• Added “Copy to Left/Right” and “Copy Line to Side” to gutter context menu.

Text Merge

• Changed line closeness calculation if it matches BC3. (Mantis 4811)
• Text merges will now prompt to save the results even if the automatically generated output matches the existing output file if that output is in the temp directory. (Mantis 4783)
• Added cue to indicate which path edit should have the ancestor file for 3-way merges. (Mantis 4821)
• Fixed showing center line details when launched from a folder merge. (Mantis 4851)
• OS X: Fixed error saving output when running bcomp as root using su. (Mantis 4839)

View Patch

• Differences in line endings are now shown as differences.
• Fixed support for patches containing ” No newline at end of file”. (Mantis 4844)

crashes

• OS X/Linux: Improved crash dialog.
• OS X/Linux: Fixed crashes when aborting FTP/FTPS transfers. (Mantis 4727)
• Fixed crash when selecting the already loaded autosaved session. (Mantis 4763)
• Fixed crash when scrolling text viewer horizontally. (Mantis 4864)
• Fixed crash when clicking a new session type in the session dropdown menu. (Mantis 4874)
• Fixes Data Compare crash for very large cells. (Mantis 4857)
• Fixed folder sync crash when using a content filter.
• Windows: Fixed crash when opening the “Check for Updates” dialog.
• Windows: Fixed crash loading the first comparison on Windows 7 and above.
• Windows: Fixed “New Folder” crash in folder browse dialog.
• OS X: Fixed crash when opening the “Enter Key” dialog and then closing the main window behind it. (Mantis 4822)
• OS X: Fixed crash when deleting a remote profile. (Mantis 4796)
• OS X: Fixed folder browse crash when accessing folders without appropriate permissions. (Mantis 4653)
• OS X: Tweaks to prevent and/or better handle crash when the application has been idle.
• Fix various memory leaks.