IDENTIFYING AND REPRESENTING CHANGES BETWEEN EXTENSIBLE MARKUP LANGUAGE (XML) FILES USING SYMBOLS WITH DATA ELEMENT INDICATION AND DIRECTION INDICATION

This disclosure is directed to techniques for providing comparing first and second XML files to one another. According to these techniques, a computing device (e.g., a version control service executing on the computing device), may be configured generate at least two edit transcripts that each include one or more operational changes that may be applied to data elements of the first XML file to arrive at data elements of the second XML file (or vice versa). The computing device may select at least one optimal edit transcript based on which of the number of operational changes of the at least two edit transcripts.