How do I compare two files in Ruby 1.9?

Question

In Ruby 1.8, I would call File.compare() from the "ftools" library to easily compare the contents of two files.

However, in Ruby 1.9, "ftools" is replaced by "fileutils", which doesn't have a "compare" method. What's the equivalent call?

score 29 · Accepted Answer · answered Nov 23 '11 at 23:19

29

Ahh, the method has been renamed to compare_file in FileUtils.

There's also an alias of "cmp" in both versions.

answered Nov 23 '11 at 23:19

Craig Walker

score 20 · Answer 2 · answered Sep 22 '15 at 22:19

20

Old question, but I just got here from google. identical? is available for those who like me prefer that coding style.

FileUtils.identical?(exp, act)

answered Sep 22 '15 at 22:19

thele101

It worked like a charm for me, I used it to make a comparison in RSpec context – Eduardo Lago Aguilar Nov 15 '16 at 16:15
if file1 is identical to file2 you can write expect(FileUtils).to be_identical(file1, file2) – Montells Nov 15 '16 at 16:16
7

**Don't confuse this with `File#identical?`**, which only checks, if the files are actually the same physical files on the drive. – Neonit Jan 12 '17 at 18:31

2 Answers2