Word – Compare Word documents while ignoring formatting differences

comparisonmicrosoft word

I've got two very long Word documents. Unfortunately, some changes have been made in both documents.

Along with the changes in content, there have been some formatting changes. One of the documents is now completely reformatted – font size, line breaks, spacing, etc. But I don't care about these changes, it's just the difference in the content that I need.

Is there a way I can check the differences / compare the two documents without paying attention to the formatting?

(I'm currently using the compare tool in Word, but it's throwing up so many formatting changes it's hard to see where the content changes have been.)

Best Answer

Do your file compare as you do it now. Then, on the “Review” tab, in the “Tracking” panel, click on the “Show Markup” button, and click on “Formatting” to deselect it:

screen shot

Related Solutions

Word – Have Microsoft Word save RTF documents in a leaner format (similar to WordPad RTF)

If there are images in the RTF document, you may want to check out this KB article from MS:

Symptom blurb:

...If an EMF, a PNG, a GIF, or a JPEG graphic is inserted into a Word document, when the document is saved, two copies of the graphic are saved in the document.

...a Microsoft Word 2000 document that contains a JPEG graphic that is saved as a Word 2000 document may have a file size of 45,568 bytes (44.5KB). However, when you save this file as Word 6.0/95 (.doc) or as Rich Text Format (.rtf), the file size may grow to 1,289,728 bytes (1.22MB).

Resolution blurb:

To prevent Word from saving two copies of the graphic in the document, and to reduce the file size of the document, add the ExportPictureWithMetafile=0 string value to the Microsoft Windows registry...

Maybe there's some help there?

MS Word 2007 – How to Merge Documents and Start Each on a New Page

There is a newpage feature in MS-Word. Here you can find more on office 2003 http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/word-help/insert-a-manual-page-break-HP005189549.aspx For the other Office versions read the links below:

Office 2007 Office 2010

If you want to read up on MS Office Document structure read take a look at this link: http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/word-help/CH006082987.aspx

EDIT:

Use this Macro, it will throw an error, if you have no open document:

Sub OpenMultipleFiles()
Dim fDialog As FileDialog

Set fDialog = Application.FileDialog(msoFileDialogFilePicker)
With fDialog
.AllowMultiSelect = True
.InitialView = msoFileDialogViewList
If .Show <> -1 Then
MsgBox "Cancelled By User", , "Cancelled"
Exit Sub
End If
End With
For i = 1 To fDialog.SelectedItems.Count
Selection.InsertFile fDialog.SelectedItems.Item(i)
Selection.InsertBreak Type:=wdPageBreak

Next i
End Sub

While in Word press ALT+F11 this brings up the VBA Editor. Afterwards expand Normal to see the Modul folder. If it does not exist click on Normal -> Insert -> Modul Paste the Macro and save.

Afterwards you can add a button with the macro to your toolbars.

Best Answer

Related Solutions

Word – Have Microsoft Word save RTF documents in a leaner format (similar to WordPad RTF)

MS Word 2007 – How to Merge Documents and Start Each on a New Page

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