I know that there are the Map and Catalog tools of ArcGIS. However, I was wondering if there is any tool for taking two .gdb folders and doing a "diff" on them. That is compairing items and noting what is different. Such a tool could be helpful in testing (regression and otherwise) of software built on top of the Arc platform, and in seeing how data sets (that are added to over time) change...
Try the Arctoolbox > Data Management Tools > Data Comparison > Feature Compare tool. You will have to walk thru each feature class one at a time or write a script/model for it but it should do what you need.
Try the Arctoolbox > Data Management Tools > Data Comparison > Feature Compare tool. You will have to walk thru each feature class one at a time or write a script/model for it but it should do what you need.
So currently there is no such tool. What you describe first sounds like checking them by hand (which is a bit tedious and error prone).
I guess I could look into the second one (if I have sufficient time). I'd want to make such a thing generic (not tied to a specific data schema).