Produce a side-by-side comparison PDF of pre- and post-update configurations by exporting both versions, running a fil…
Open Adobe Acrobat on your computer.
Go to Tools and select Compare Files.
Click Select File under 'Compare' and choose your first PDF (the older or original version).
Click Select File under 'With' and choose your second PDF (the newer or revised version).
Click Compare to start the comparison.
Review the results in the comparison summary and use the side-by-side view to examine highlighted differences.
Best practiceFor best results, avoid using scanned PDFs as input files, as text recognition may be inconsistent.
You can filter the comparison results to focus on text, images, or formatting changes for a clearer review.
This runs in the Acrobat app - there is no separate API for this task.
The 'Compare text only' option tells Acrobat to ignore any pictures or graphics in your documents. It will only look for differences in the written words. This is useful if you only care about text changes, like in a text-based configuration file.
You get a 'security settings' error because one or both of your configuration snapshot files are protected. Acrobat cannot compare files that have security rules preventing changes or viewing. You must first remove these security settings from both files before you can compare them.
When you compare two signed document versions, Acrobat will show you all the changes made to the document *after* it was signed. This is very useful for checking if a document has been tampered with or altered in any way after a digital signature was applied, ensuring its integrity.