---
description: >-
  also How to use Beyond Compare at the Command Line (CLI) or How to use Beyond
  Compare with scripts
---

# How to use Beyond Compare in the Terminal

At the command line, the usual way to run Beyond Compare is&#x20;

in Windows: `bcomp.exe @nameofmyscript.bc  somefile.txt otherfile.txt`

in Linux or Mac: `bcomp @nameofmyscript.bc  somefile.txt otherfile.txt`

The easiest procedure is to go to Scooter's [support page](https://www.scootersoftware.com/v4help/index.html?sample_scripts.html) and shop around for a script that seems similar.  Here is a four line script, followed by the syntax for running it in Windows.

![](https://1446155253-files.gitbook.io/~/files/v0/b/gitbook-legacy-files/o/assets%2F-LXUX-uoaZJ8T4qyEc-x%2F-LXznCso4FPm64L34cFt%2F-LXzozLAHcVjNYmvp40F%2Fscript%20windows%20beyond%20compare.png?alt=media\&token=3e03046a-2636-458e-beb8-20448772e86b)

.In the example above, the ampersand is used to continue a long command on the next line.  The first line tells what we want to do (make a report of the differences in something), the second line is the report format, the third line says that we want the report to print to a text file called wipe.out.  The fourth line "tigers1 <--> tigers2"  indicates we have made this comparison before so the file specifics are in a saved session done earlier in the Beyond Compare GUI.&#x20;



Here is a five line script, followed by the syntax for running it in Linux.

![](https://1446155253-files.gitbook.io/~/files/v0/b/gitbook-legacy-files/o/assets%2F-LXUX-uoaZJ8T4qyEc-x%2F-LXznCso4FPm64L34cFt%2F-LXzot_36R6bZBkkQZMA%2Fkubuntu%20desktop%20beyond%20compare.jpg?alt=media\&token=ade5aefb-8d15-4708-9afe-870c823325cb)

In the example above we use %1, %2 to pass in command line arguments, in this case, the folders to be compared. &#x20;

One general caveat for command line scripting of Beyond Compare: not all features from the GUI are possible as a script.  BC was built to be a GUI program.  The scripting is a tiny subset of the BC GUI commands.

.
