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Brent Strange's thoughts on Software Quality Assurance and technology

 
Tuesday, November 28, 2006
 
 

What do you use for a system differencing tool?

 
 

It sure is a challenge to find the Windows Server 2003 Resource Kit. Why does Microsoft make it so hard to find? You can download it here (thanks Matt).

I was hoping to find a version of SysDiff on it for Server 2003. No such luck. After getting a version of SysDiff here I attempted to run it on Server 2003 and... it doesn't work. Microsoft wants you to use Wininstall LE now.

Wininstall doesn't seem to be all that. I need a tool that I can take system snapshots (before and after an application installation), compare and report the differences. I'd like to track the following changes on Server 2003:

  • Files
  • Folders
  • Registry
  • Users
  • Groups
  • Permissions
  • Wishful thinking: SQL 2000 and 2005 schema changes

I've found WinAlysis and it seems promising. What tool do you use?