Tricks of the Trade: Use Diff Merge to Compare / Validate MEDITECH Reports

By: John Sharpe, President, Comstock Software, Inc.

Manually comparing 2 reports is hard on the eyes and tedious work. Like most IT workers, you know there must be an easier way. And, you’re right - there is another way. Source Gear has developed a free software application Diff Merge. Diff Merge allows you to visually compare 2 files.

Next time you’ve finished a change to a MEDITECH report; DOWNLOAD 2 copies of the report to your desktop computer. One copy will be from the Production report, the second copy will be from the Development report, where you’ve made your changes. Then use Diff Merge to compare and review file differences. You’ll find this method of comparing files to be more accurate than manually spot-checking your changes. Once you’ve validated your changes, you’ll be able to pass the baton to your MEDITECH end-user for Acceptance Testing.

To get started, you might need approval from your IT Leadership to install this free utility. Then download and install Diff Merge from http://www.sourcegear.com/diffmerge/.

1. Print your Production report to DOWNLOAD. Select Download and Browse. Save report output using a meaningful file name.

2. Print your Development report to DOWNLOAD. Select Download and Browse. Save report output using a meaningful file name.

3. Navigate to your computer’s desktop; right click and compare the 2 files. You will need Diff Merge already installed on your computer to perform this step.

4. Click OK to continue.

5. Review the files in Diff Merge. Lines that have differences will be highlighted.

6. Make changes as appropriate to your Development report until you are ready to turn the report over to end-users for Acceptance Testing.

Using Diff Merge to quickly get an estimate of what’s changed, between the Production and Development version of a report, means you’ll have fewer surprises when your report goes LIVE.

Thoughts or Questions? Email them to John at jsharpe@comstock-software.com.

John Sharpe is President / NPR Consultant at Comstock Software, Inc. Learn more about NPR Report Writing at the MEDITECH NPR Report Writing Blog.