How can I integrate Meld with the Windows shell?

Question

I moved from using Linux Mint to Windows 10. I have installed Meld for windows. How do I get 'meld' to appear when right-clicking after I have selected two files in Windows Explorer?

Answer 1

There is a workaround:

Open the ‘Send To’ shortcut folder by opening the Run window with WIN + R, and then enter shell:sendto

Within the folder that opens, simply add a shortcut to your Meld executable, e.g. C:\Program Files (x86)\Meld\Meld.exe.

You should now be able to select two files and send them to Meld under the ‘Send To’ submenu of right-click context menu.

From Windows context menu shortcuts to quickly merge files with Meld

Answer 2

Here is a Super User question about how to add an "Open with" context menu, which will let you open one file with Meld and might just work with two. Can you please try it & let us know?

If it doesn't, at least you have one opened and will have to manually open the other in Meld (drag & drop ought to make that easy).

See also How to Manually Edit the Right Click Menu in Windows and Best Context Menu Editors for Windows.

What I don't know how to do, is what Beyond Compare does and have a "Select left file for compare" menu, which changes to "Compare with <previously selected file name>".

I note that if I select two files, Beyond Compare changes the context menu to "Compare" and will load those two files if selected, so this might work with Meld too (if I select more than two files, Beyond Compare will not add any entry to the context menu).

Answer 3

Here is the answer for the search of how to add to Context Menu. It still works for Windows 10: Reference link: https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/meld/-/issues/278

Solution:

Step 1 Download singleinstance.exe from context-menu-handler

Step 2 Create a file with extension ".reg"

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT*\shell\DiffIt_Files] @="Diff it!" "Icon"="C:\Program Files (x86)\Meld\Meld.exe"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT*\shell\DiffIt_Files\command] @=""c:\Bin\singleinstance.exe" "%1" "C:\Program Files (x86)\Meld\Meld.exe" $files --si-timeout 400"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Folder\shell\DiffIt_Folders] @="Diff It!" "Icon"="C:\Program Files (x86)\Meld\Meld.exe"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Folder\shell\DiffIt_Folders\command]
@=""c:\Bin\singleinstance.exe" "%1" "C:\Program Files (x86)\Meld\Meld.exe" $files --si-timeout 400" The reg file create a context menu entry labelled "Diff It!" for all files (*) and for Folders (Folder). The lines containing the Icon can be removed if you don't want an icon.

Adapt the path of the program singleinstance.exe and the command run (here C:\Program Files (x86)\Meld\Meld.exe. Note the escaping of the backspaces and the quotes

Step 3 Run the .reg file. Double clicking on it might work if you are admin. Otherwise open an admin command prompt in your folder (in explorer: File>Open Command> Open Command as admin. or Alt-F-M-A). Simply Type the name of the .reg file to add it to the registry.

That's it.

To Uninstall:

(uninstall) You can either delete the keys manually in the registry or create a .reg file with the following content:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[-HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT*\shell\DiffIt_Files]

[-HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Folder\shell\DiffIt_Folders]