Way to present programming code side by side to show the differences to the reader?

Question

I am trying to make a side by side comparison of the result of listing-mode and minted-mode for a piece of Ruby and Java-code. I have problems making this look 'side by side'. Any suggestions to make the programming code appear side by side?

 % !TEX TS-program = pdflatex
% !TEX encoding = UTF-8 Unicode

% This is a simple template for a LaTeX document using the "article" class.
% See "book", "report", "letter" for other types of document.

\documentclass{article} % use larger type; default would be 10pt

\usepackage[utf8]{inputenc} % set input encoding (not needed with XeLaTeX)

%%% Examples of Article customizations
% These packages are optional, depending whether you want the features they provide.
% See the LaTeX Companion or other references for full information.

%%% PAGE DIMENSIONS
\usepackage{geometry} % to change the page dimensions
\geometry{a4paper} % or letterpaper (US) or a5paper or....
% \geometry{margin=2in} % for example, change the margins to 2 inches all round
% \geometry{landscape} % set up the page for landscape
%   read geometry.pdf for detailed page layout information

\usepackage{graphicx} % support the \includegraphics command and options

% \usepackage[parfill]{parskip} % Activate to begin paragraphs with an empty line rather than an indent

%%% PACKAGES
\usepackage{booktabs} % for much better looking tables
\usepackage{array} % for better arrays (eg matrices) in maths
\usepackage{paralist} % very flexible & customisable lists (eg. enumerate/itemize, etc.)
\usepackage{verbatim} % adds environment for commenting out blocks of text & for better verbatim
\usepackage{subfig} % make it possible to include more than one
                    % captioned figure/table in a single float
\usepackage{multicol}
\usepackage{xcolor}
\usepackage{minted}
\usepackage{listings}
\lstloadlanguages{Ruby}
\lstloadlanguages{Java}
\lstset{%
basicstyle=\ttfamily\color{black},
commentstyle = \ttfamily\color{red},
keywordstyle=\ttfamily\color{blue},
stringstyle=\color{orange}}

% These packages are all incorporated in the memoir class to one degree or another...

%%% HEADERS & FOOTERS
\usepackage{fancyhdr} % This should be set AFTER setting up the page geometry
\pagestyle{fancy} % options: empty , plain , fancy
\renewcommand{\headrulewidth}{0pt} % customise the layout...
\lhead{}\chead{}\rhead{}
\lfoot{}\cfoot{\thepage}\rfoot{}

%%% SECTION TITLE APPEARANCE
\usepackage{sectsty}
\allsectionsfont{\sffamily\mdseries\upshape} % (See the fntguide.pdf for font help)
% (This matches ConTeXt defaults)

%%% ToC (table of contents) APPEARANCE
\usepackage[nottoc,notlof,notlot]{tocbibind} % Put the bibliography in the ToC
\usepackage[titles,subfigure]{tocloft} % Alter the style of the Table of Contents
\renewcommand{\cftsecfont}{\rmfamily\mdseries\upshape}
\renewcommand{\cftsecpagefont}{\rmfamily\mdseries\upshape} % No bold!

%%% END Article customizations

%%% The "real" document content comes below...

\title{Verschil listing of minted syntax hightlighting \\ Een onderzoekje}

\author{ir. G.M. Borkent}
%\date{} % Activate to display a given date or no date (if empty),
         % otherwise the current date is printed 

\begin{document}
\maketitle

\section{Verschil tussen listing en minted syntax highlighting}
\subsection{Vergelijking Ruby}
\begin{minipage}[b]{0.5\linewidth}
\centering
Listing-mode:
\begin{lstlisting}[language=Ruby]

#this is a comment

a = 5
b = a * 5
puts b
puts b + 3

class Test < Test::SomeClass
@test = 3
    def bar
        if foo
            puts "foo"
        else
            puts "bar"
        end
    end
end
\end{lstlisting}
\end{minipage}
\begin{minipage}[b]{0.5\linewidth}
\centering
\noindent
Minted-mode:
\begin{minted}{ruby}
#this is a comment

a = 5
b = a * 5
puts b
puts b + 3

class Test < Test::SomeClass
@test = 3
    def bar
        if foo
            puts "foo"
        else
            puts "bar"
        end
    end
end
\end{minted}
\end{minipage}

\subsection{Vergelijking Java}
\begin{minipage}[b]{0.5\linewidth}
\centering
\noindent
Listing-mode
\begin{lstlisting}[language=Java]
public static void main(String[] args) {
    int a = 3;
}
\end{lstlisting}

\end{minipage}

\begin{minipage}[b]{0.5\linewidth}
\centering
\noindent
Minted-mode
\begin{minted}{java}

public static void main(String[] args) {
    int a = 3;
}
\end{minted}

\end{minipage}

\section{Conclusie}
Minted-mode ziet er mooier uit\ldots 

\end{document}

Answer 1

You need either to allow line breaks (option breaklines for listings), use a smaller font size to fit the text on the \columnwidth, or scale the code environments directly to \columnwidth using \Resizebox{\columnwidth}{!}{<content>} (realboxes package) or \begin{adjustbox}{width=\columnwidth} ... \end{adjustbox} (adjustbox package). Note that the normal \scalebox or \resizebox doesn't work with verbatim content.

---

Edit:

It seems that minted environments can't be saved in boxes (I get a Something's wrong--perhaps a missing \item. error), which breaks the use of adjustbox. I already noted before that the LaTeX part of minted isn't very good implemented. Looking at the code I even see that unwanted spaces are introduces, which is kind of a beginner error. You might want to simply lower the font size until it fits, e.g. use \scriptsize around the code environments.