Overview
DeltaXML ODT Merge reads in multiple OpenDocument format text documents (typically with extension .odt) and generates a new document that shows all the differences between the two input documents.
The differences or changes made by each author are shown using text highlighting, and are also merged into one set of edits which can then be accepted or rejected. An option allows you to choose to: always show the changes individually, or only when there are changes by two or more authors, or never.
You can choose the font style, weight and decoration to highlight changes.
Changes to text styles (formatting) are not shown.
Images and similar objects are compared and an option allows for all the variants to be output, although the differences are not shown.
All the options can be set up via the Java API.
OpenDocument Versions
OASIS Open Document Format for Office Applications (OpenDocument) Specification v1.1 (typically with extension .odt) is supported. You need to ensure that this is the format you have saved to - the default is often version 1.2 which is not supported yet. If you Merge 1.2 documents, some results may be incorrect, for example the way that list numbering is handled differs in 1.1 and 1.2.
Users of Microsoft Office can also save and open documents in ODF if you upgrade to SP2 (made available late 2009). Note that Microsoft Office does not support reading or writing of tracked changes.
Result Validity
The product has been extensively tested with OpenOffice.org and not with any other ODF applications. OpenOffice.org is able to read in many different formats and can therefore convert these to OpenDocument format file version 1.1 simply by writing them out again in this format.