
                  HEXCOMPARE - Visual File Comparison Utility
                  http://sourceforge.net/projects/hexcompare/


DESCRIPTION:
------------
  hexcompare is a tool used to compare two binary or ASCII files. In overview
mode, it presents a block diagram which quickly displays what's the
same/different between two sets of files.


LICENSE:
--------
  hexcompare is released under the GNU GPLv3.


HOW TO COMPILE:
---------------
  Enter the "make" command in your terminal, minus the quote. It will produce
an executable called "hexcompare". This is our program.


HOW TO INTERPRET:
-----------------
  Start the program by using the files you want to compare as the arguments.
For instance:

   ./hexcompare file_one file_two

  Once in the program has started, you will see that the screen is divided
into two. In the top portion, you have the "overview." This is a block diagram
representing the differences between both files at a given offset.

  A blue block means that the bytes that it represents are the same between
both files. Red means that they're different. Grey means that neither file has
any data at an offset.

  Each block represents a number of bytes. How many bytes are represented
depends on your terminal window size: the bigger it is, the more blocks that
can be fit on screen. The more blocks on screen, the more the files are
divided up into smaller chunks of bytes.

  The bottom half of the screen contains the raw data at a specified offset.
Using the "m" key will alternate the display between presenting the data as
hex and as ASCII. Pressing "v" will make the data view of the lower part of
the screen take up the whole terminal.


HOW TO NAVIGATE:
----------------
  The mouse can be used to navigate the block diagram "overview." Single
clicking on a block will load in the offset represented by that block, and
show the data that's found there.

  Double-clicking on a block will bring up a more detailed hex view of the
specified location.

  The arrow keys can be used to go from block to block in the overview. Page
Up/Down can be used to go up/down lines of hex/ASCII data.


CHANGELOG:
----------
1.0.4   Mateusz Viste contributed several patches that improve portability,
        remove unnecessary dependencies and fix a few cosmetical issues, also
        fixed a flicker issue reported by Rene Liebscher.
1.0.3   Tomasz Wasilczyk contributed numerous fixes to correct eroneous
        comparisons, compiler warnings and build issues.
1.0.2   More efficient byte comparison scheme.
1.0.1   Thanks to Grawity: fixed how the files were tarred together. Thanks to
        pickledspiders: changed from -curses to -lcurses in the Makefile.
1.0.0   Initial Release by Julien McArdle (julien.im)

=========================================================
