Comparing objects

When you have many objects in your repository you might want to compare them to keep track of the differences.

You can compare two objects of the same type. For example, you can compare a parallel job with another parallel job. You can compare the following objects:
  • Parallel jobs
  • Server jobs
  • Mainframe jobs
  • Job sequences
  • Parallel shared containers
  • Server shared containers
  • Parallel routines
  • Server routines
  • Mainframe routines
  • Table definitions
  • Data connections

You can compare two objects that are in the same project or compare two objects that are in two different projects. For example, you can compare the table definition named CA_address_data in the project named MK_team with the table named Cal_addresses in the project named WB_team.

The Designer client displays descriptions of all the differences between the two objects in a hierarchical tree structure. You can expand branches in the tree to view the details. Click the underlined link in the description to view the changed object.

The details that are displayed depend on the types of object that you are comparing. For example, the following picture shows the result of comparing two table definitions.

Figure 1. Results of comparing two table definitions
Shows the results that are displayed when two table definition objects are compared.

If you compare objects that contain differences in multi-line text (for example, source code in routines), the change tree displays a View button. Click View to view the source code. By default the source is displayed in Notepad, but you can choose a different application in the Designer client options. Select Tools > Options and select Comparison Tool to view comparison tool options.