The use cases of Beyond Compare in the Organizational Unit repositories, as a tool for comparison and synchronization of folders and files, are discussed in an earlier article. For its use in this particular section, comparison between two zipped directories for file recovery is emphasized.

The comparison between zipped directories is the same as comparing files and folders of the OU repositories. This is because in Beyond Compare, the ZIP files are also treated as folders. In file recovery, the differences between the two zipped directories will indicate as to which files are currently missing and are needed to be restored. The identified files can then be extracted and copied into the OU repository where it was accidentally deleted.

Starting .zip file comparison

1. Double-click on the Beyond Compare icon .

2. On the Open Dialog, select Folders. Click on the folder icon to browse for the zipped directories.

Locate the backup files needed for comparison.

3. Click on the OK button to start the comparison.

4. The result will locate the difference between the two backups.

The file difference indicates that it is the missing file that needs to be recovered. For file recovery, the file can be extracted from the zip and it can be copied to the repository.