"Renaming" the left and right files.

[Neddy Seagoon]

This isn't a request to rename files rather giving a friendly name to the left- and right-hand names. For example, I've got two files open, let's call them a.txt and b.txt and I saved a new session. Opening the session works fine as expected. If I swap the files in the IDE the text panes swap, again as expected. Where there might be (to me) some confusion is if I might inadvertently make a change to the wrong text file. I know, it's a silly thing to do, my fault, take the rap, serve the time, move on, lessons learned.

Seriously, I was wondering if it's possible to give a sort of friendly name to the text panes? Each pane contains the pathname but is it possible to give a friendly name to a.txt and call it "My file" and give b.txt a name like "Source control file"? Then if I swap the files around, the friendly names could move with them like the pathnames do. I'd not use it all the time but I'd like to know if it's possible and if so, how to do it. There seems to be a bit of free space under the pathname where other file details are displayed like the date/time stamp, file size and so on.

Edit: If my screenshot gets through it shows what I'm looking to do.

[Aaron]

Hello,

How are you currently launching the Text Compare? Is it as a difftool from an IDE? If so, we have additional parameters you can add: /title1 and /title2, which will replace the text in the file path bar. Most IDE's provide a variable for the file name, and you can additionally add other keywords like "left" or another identifier if needed. Other version control software have their own %title1 variables that include all sorts of managed information we can display with the /title1= command line.

[Neddy Seagoon]

Aaron, Apologies for not replying sooner. I'm launching directly from BC4's Windows desktop icon. I then select the session name.

[Aaron]

Hello,

Oh, is BC4 the "IDE" in this case? We're just a difftool or text editor, but if you open two files manually and want to prevent accidentally editing one, you can set Disable Editing in the Session Settings, Specs tab. Even after a Swap Sides, that file would still be protected. If you are launching in a manner where one specific side (left) should always have Disable Editing enabled, you could alter the Desktop shortcut to launch in a way so that side is always set to Disable Editing (/ro1 or /ro2 added to the command line).