Wednesday, December 15, 2010

File Verifier++ : A Windows File Integrity Checker

File integrity checks should play an important part in a computer system’s backup strategy. Nothing is worse than having to find out that the needed backups are corrupt and cannot be used anymore for restoration purposes.
File Verifier++ is an Open Source software for the Windows operating system that can create and store hash values of selected files and check their integrity whenever it is needed.


It begins by adding files or directories with files to the program. A click on files or dirs in the main menubar opens a file and folder browser to do that. all files are then added to the program listing and hashes are calculated automatically for them.
Information such as the file path on the system, hash, encoding, algorithm used to compute the has, size, modification time and verification are displayed in a table in the main interface.
The message log details which operations have been started and completed in the program. This includes how many files have been processed at what speed and time.
File listings can be stored on the computer system to load and verify them against the file hashes of existing programs.
Identical (or valid) files are highlighted in green, files that fail the verification check in red. Files can also be highlighted in blue if the hash and file size is identical but the modification date differs. The program does not only use a files hash to verify its integrity but also the file size, file attributes and modification time.
The default algorithm used is MD5, the program does support several other algorithms including CRC, SHA or RMD.

File Verifier++ Features

  • Can load and save results to and from various formats.
  • Hash algorithms can be added through the DLL interface.
  • Hash verification. Can load hash results and compare to what is actually on your disk.
  • Color coding of validity states
  • Verification considers file size, file attributes, and modification date to be significant.
  • Drag and drop support.
  • Recursive directory processing.
  • Recursive processing using patterns.
  • Calculates hashes on strings.
  • Search and grep using regular expressions.
  • Selective verification.
  • Unicode support (recognizes Unicode file names and writes results encoded in UTF-8 (without BOM))
  • Supports Windows XP Visual Styles
  • Shell Integration (Shell extension).
  • Can be installed using installer or without.
  • Command line version. (in beta)
File Verifier++ comes with several extras that are accessible through the file menu. It is for instance possible to use the advanced processing module to process multiple directories with select patterns or regular expressions as filters.
The program is fully compatible with 32-bit and 64-bit versions of the Windows operating system. The portable version can be run from any location, ideal for storing it with the file verification information on burned CDs, DVDs or other backup storage locations.


No comments:

Post a Comment