When I write a paper, it usually goes through many versions before being submitted to a journal. I keep track of the different versions by renaming the file when I’m about to make major changes, or when I receive a new version from a coauthor. The files are named file1.tex,file2.tex, etc. where “file” is replaced by something more meaningful.

It is often useful to be able to compare versions to see what changes have been made, especially when working with coauthors. It is possible to use text comparison software such asCompare It!, but LaTeX files often have insignificant changes due to line wrapping which make no difference to the output, and there is no point in identifying these changes.

I recently discovered a great solution which finds real LaTeX changes and ignores changes due to line wrapping. It is LaTeXdiff.The good news is that MikTeX users already have it, although you probably don’t realise it.

To use it, you need both MikTeX and Perl installed on your computer. I’ll assume you already have MikTeX. If you create R packages for Windows, you will also have Perl. Otherwise, one simple way to get Perl is to install Rtools.

The simplest way to proceed once Perl is installed, is to use the following command (from a DOS prompt)

latexdiff-so file1.tex file2.tex > diff.tex

If you are using MikTeX, then the latexdiff-so command should work from any DOS prompt. Then just process the file diff.tex as you normally do (probably in WinEdt).