title: Getting WinMerge to compare .jar files
body: <p>I have two directories which contain a handful of *.jar and *.war archives, as well as some metadata files and a file with *.spring extension, which is really just a zip file with an odd name. Something like this:</p>
  
  <pre><code>- dist1
      - a subfolder
          - some text file.txt
      - application-context.xml
      - arch1.jar
      - arch2.jar
      - arch3.jar
      - super-cool.war
      - xtremely-awesome.spring
  - dist2
      - a subfolder
          - some text file.txt
      - application-context.xml
      - arch1.jar
      - arch2.jar
      - arch3.jar
      - super-cool.war
      - xtremely-awesome.spring
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>I'd like to do directory comparison on these directories, comparing the archives as if they were subfolders rather than binary files. Other files, both text and binary files both outside and inside the archives, should be compared as usual.</p>
  
  <p>I know I could just explode all the archives manually and compare the exploded versions, but since they are generated by a build script and exploding them adds a considerable amount of time for building the project, it would be nicer to just do it for the comparison, preferrably within the diff tool.</p>
  
  <p>I've tried using <a href="http://winmerge.org" rel="nofollow">WinMerge</a> with the <a href="http://winmerge.org/downloads/plugins.php" rel="nofollow">7zip plugin</a>, but I can't get the plugin to work (the files are not recognized as archives in the folder compare view). I've tried both installing as a "shared installation" and as an "application specific installation" (pointing the installer to <code>C:\Programs\WinMerge\WinMergeU.exe</code>). I've also tried manually copying the .dll files from the plugin into the <code>MergePlugins</code> folder, without success.</p>
  
  <p>How do I get this working in WinMerge? And if it's not possible, is there some other good tool that has this capability?</p>