Adjusting comparison sensitivity

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GroupDocs.Comparison allows you to adjust comparison sensitivity to achieve the necessary balance between the comparison speed and accuracy. Possible comparison sensitivity value ranges from 0 to 100.

  • Minimal value (0) sets sensitivity to a minimal value providing the fastest comparison speed, but it may produce the worst comparison quality. If there is at least one common letter in two compared words then these words are not treated as fully inserted and deleted
  • Value by default means 75. Comparison occurs when the percentage of deleted or inserted elements in relation to all elements does not exceed 75%
  • Maximum value (100) provides the best quality, but slowest comparison speed. Comparison occurs at any length of a common sub-sequence of two compared objects

For a better understanding of how comparison algorithms work let’s suppose we have two strings:

Strings
1. It is our equity poetry
2. Jack is a glad calf

So, these strings have two common sub-sequences: “is” word and 4 space symbols.  Common sub-sequence is - " is " and its length is 4 symbols (there are 2 space symbols in it).
The length of the inserted sub-sequence is 13 symbols - Jackagladcalf
Removed sub-sequence length is 17 symbols - Itourequitypoetry

Let’s calculate the percent of removed and inserted symbols: (17 + 13) / (17 + 13 + 4) * 100 = 88%

Case 1. If SensitivityOfComparison = 80%, the comparison of these two strings produces the next result:
Jack is a glad calfIt is our equity poetry

Because the calculated percent of removed and inserted symbols (88%) is greater than the SensitivityOfComparison value (80%), then this common sub-sequence will be not taken into account.
The first string will be considered as completely removed, and the second string will be considered as completely inserted. The same results are produced for any calculated percent less than 88%.

Case 2. If SensitivityOfComparison = 89%, the comparison of these two strings produces the next result:
JackIt is aour gladequity calfpoetry

A common sub-sequence was found because the calculated percent of removed and inserted symbols (88%) is less than the SensitivityOfComparison value (89%). The same results are produced for any calculated percent bigger than 88%.

To compare documents with specific comparison sensitivity, follow these steps:

  1. Instantiate the Comparer object. Specify the source document path or stream.
  2. Call the add() method. Specify the target document path or stream.
  3. Instantiate the CompareOptions object. Call the setSensitivityOfComparison() method to specify the appropriate value.
  4. Call the compare() method. Specify the CompareOptions object.

The following code snippet shows how to compare documents with specific sensitivity:

const comparer = new groupdocs.comparison.Comparer(sourceFile);
comparer.add(targetFile);

const compareOptions = new groupdocs.comparison.CompareOptions();
compareOptions.setSensitivityOfComparison(100);

const resultPath = comparer.compare(resultFile, compareOptions);

The result is as follows:

SensitivityOfComparison = 50SensitivityOfComparison = 100

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