Hi, I got the code (from the internet)for comparing two files and showing the difference in contents.Now,I tried the same code for two files written in japanese language(kanji).If I save the two japanese .txt files in ANSI format,it works fine,but, if I save them in formats like 'UTF-8','unicode','unicode bigendian',it doesn't show the differences properly....keeps showing odd symbols instead of the japanese characters. Would be glad if someone could suggest some simple way of making it work for all formats(if it's possible). The code I am using is the one pasted below:

#!C:\perl\bin\perl.exe
# file_compare.pl
# Purpose: compare two files and show differences

use strict;
use warnings;

my $file1 ='E:\files\file_1.txt' or die "filename missing \n";
my $file2 = 'E:\files\file_2.txt' or die "filename missing \n";

open (FILE1, "< $file1") or die "Can not read file $file1: $! \n";
my @file1_contents = <FILE1>; # read entire contents of file
close (FILE1);

open (FILE2, "< $file2") or die "Can not read file $file2: $! \n";
my @file2_contents = <FILE2>; # read entire contents of file
close (FILE2);

my $length1 = $#file1_contents; # number of lines in first file
my $length2 = $#file2_contents; # number of lines in second file

if ($length1 > $length2) {
# first file contains more lines than second file
my $counter2 = 0;
foreach my $line_file1 (@file1_contents) {
chomp ($line_file1);

if (defined ($file2_contents[$counter2])) {
# line exists in second file
chomp (my $line_file2 = $file2_contents[$counter2]);

if ($line_file1 ne $line_file2) {
print "\nline " . ($counter2 + 1) . " \n";
print "< $line_file1 \n" if ($line_file1 ne ""); 
print "--- \n";
print "> $line_file2 \n\n" if ($line_file2 ne "");
}
}
else {
# there is no line in second file
print "\nline " . ($counter2 + 1) . " \n";
print "< $line_file1 \n" if ($line_file1 ne ""); 
print "--- \n";
print "> \n"; # this line does not exist in file2
}
$counter2++; # point to the next line in file2
}
}
else {
# second file contains more lines than first file
# or both have equal number of lines
my $counter1 = 0;
foreach my $line_file2 (@file2_contents) {
chomp ($line_file2);

if (defined ($file1_contents[$counter1])) {
# line exists in first file
chomp (my $line_file1 = $file1_contents[$counter1]);

if ($line_file1 ne $line_file2) {
print "\nline " . ($counter1 + 1) . " \n";
print "< $line_file1 \n" if ($line_file1 ne "");
print "--- \n";
print "> $line_file2 \n" if ($line_file2 ne "");
}
}
else {
# there is no line in first file
print "\nline " . ($counter1 + 1) . " \n";
print "< \n"; # this line does not exist in file1
print "--- \n";
print "> $line_file2 \n" if ($line_file2 ne "");
}
$counter1++; # point to next line in file1
}
}
[download]

Thanks in advance for any help.

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