Fossil

manifest also contains a check-in comment, the date and time
when the check-in was established, who created the check-in,
and links to other check-ins from which the current check-in
is derived.  There is also a couple of checksums used to verify
the integrity of the check-in.  And the whole manifest might
be PGP clearsigned.</p>

<h3><a name="keyconc">2.3</a> Key concepts</h3>

<ul>
<li>A <b>check-in</b> is a set of files arranged
    in a hierarchy.</li>
<li>A <b>repository</b> keeps a record of historical check-ins.</li>
<li>Repositories share their changes using <b>push</b>, <b>pull</b>,
    <b>sync</b>, and <b>clone</b>.</li>
<li>A particular <u>version</u> of a particular file is an <b>artifact</b>
    that is identified by an <b>artifact ID</b>.</li>
<li>Artifacts tracked by fossil are inherently immutable.</li>
<li>Fossil automatically generates a <b>manifest</b> file that identifies
    every artifact in a check-in.</li>
<li>The artifact ID of the manifest is the identifier of the check-in.</li>
</ul>

    either download a 
    <a href="http://www.fossil-scm.org/download.html">precompiled binary</a>
    or <a href="build.wiki">build it yourself</a> from sources.
    Install fossil by putting the fossil binary
    someplace on your PATH environment variable.</p>
    
    </blockquote>
    <a name="#fslclone"><h2>Cloning An Existing Repository</h2></a>
    <blockquote>

    <p>Most fossil operations interact with a repository that is on the
    local disk drive, not on a remote system.  Hence, before accessing
    a remote repository it is necessary to make a local copy of that
    repository.  Making a local copy of a remote repository is called
    "cloning".</p>

  * Any fossil command is acceptable once enough of it has been
  entered to make the intent unambiguous.  'clo' is a proper prefix of
  both the 'clone' and 'close' commands, for instance, but 'clon' is
  enough to make the intent—the 'clone'
  command—unambiguous.

  * Pragmatically, a [./concepts.wiki#keyconc | <u>version</u>]
  in <b>fossil</b> is a 40-character long string of hexadecimal.
  <b>fossil</b> will be able to figure out which version you want
  with any <i>distinct</i> prefix of that string which is at
  least four characters long.  <em>Commands which require a
  version are looking for the string, a distinct prefix of the
  string, or a <code>tag</code>.</em>

  * SCM in a distributed environment can be a bit confusing with
  regard to branching, merging, and versions in general.  See the
  [./branching.wiki | explanation of branching] and it will all make
  much more sense.

  * <i>Op.Ed.</i> An excellent way to learn to use <b>fossil</b>
    effectively is to
    [./quickstart.wiki#fslclone | clone the repository for fossil]
    itself.  You can then poke around using the <code>fossil ui</code>
    command, and look things up with no connection worries.  You can
    set up test repositories and try things out on-the-fly to see how
    they work, using their own ui's.  The CLI will far easier to
    understand if you can run a repository, watch it in a browser, and
    hack around with it in a simplified environment (your tests) with
    guaranteed and fast access to the sources & docs (your cloned fossil
    repository).
<br /><br /> <br />
  <b>You should</b> probably start interacting with fossil at the command
  line by asking it what it can
  do:&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a name="tof">&#710;</a>

  <code>$ fossil help</code><nowiki><pre>
Usage: fossil help COMMAND.
Available COMMANDs:</pre><table width="80%"
                          style="font-family: fixed, courier, monospace;">
  <tr>
    <td><a href="#add">add</a>*</td>
    <td><a href="#checkout">co</a>*</td>
    <td><a href="#http">http</a></td>
    <td><a href="#rebuild">rebuild</a></td>
    <td><a href="#sync">sync</a>*</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><a href="#all">all</a>*</td>
    <td><a href="#commit">commit</a></td>
    <td><a href="#info">info</a></td>
    <td><a href="#reconstruct">reconstruct</a></td>
    <td><a href="#tag">tag</a></td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><a href="#branch">branch</a></td>
    <td><a href="#configuration">configuration</a></td>
    <td><a href="#leaves">leaves</a></td>
    <td><a href="#redo">redo</a></td>
    <td><a href="#timeline">timeline</a></td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><a href="#cgi">cgi</a>*</td>
    <td><a href="#deconstruct">deconstruct</a></td>
    <td><a href="#ls">ls</a>*</td>
    <td><a href="#mv">rename</a>*</td>
    <td><a href="#server">ui</a></td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><a href="#changes">changes</a>*</td>
    <td><a href="#rm">del</a>*</td>
    <td><a href="#merge">merge</a></td>
    <td><a href="#revert">revert</a></td>
    <td><a href="#undo">undo</a></td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><a href="#checkout">checkout</a>*</td>
    <td><a href="#descendants">descendants</a></td>
    <td><a href="#mv">mv</a>*</td>
    <td><a href="#rm">rm</a>*</td>
    <td><a href="#setting">unset</a></td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><a href="#commit">ci</a></td>
    <td><a href="#diff">diff</a></td>
    <td><a href="#new">new</a>*</td>
    <td><a href="#rstats">rstats</a></td>
    <td><a href="#update">update</a>*</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><a href="#clean">clean</a></td>
    <td><a href="#extra">extra</a>*</td>
    <td><a href="#open">open</a></td>
    <td><a href="#server">server</a></td>
    <td><a href="#user">user</a></td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><a href="#clone">clone</a></td>
    <td><a href="#diff">gdiff</a></td>
    <td><a href="#pull">pull</a></td>
    <td><a href="#setting">settings</a></td>
    <td><a href="#version">version</a>*</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><a href="#close">close</a></td>
    <td><a href="#help">help</a></td>
    <td><a href="#push">push</a></td>
    <td><a href="#status">status</a>*</td>
    <td><a href="#wiki">wiki</a></td>
  </tr>












</table><nowiki><pre>
This is fossil version [a89b436bc9] 2009-02-11 05:00:02 UTC
</pre>
<b>What follows</b> is a survey of what you get if you type<code>
fossil&nbsp;help&nbsp;<i>command</i> </code>for all of the
commands listed above.  There are links to individual pages for each
of them; pages with content (commands marked with a '*' are done) go
into the reason for a command in a bit more depth than the program help.
<pre>

    rebuild    Rebuild on all repositories

    sync       Run a "sync" on all repositories

    Respositories are automatically added to the set of known repositories
    when one of the following commands against the repository: clone, info,
    pull, push, or sync

<hr><a href="#tof">&#710;</a>
    <a name="branch">Usage: </a><code><a href="cmd_branch.wiki">fossil branch</a></code> SUBCOMMAND ... ?-R|--repository FILE?

Run various subcommands on the branches of the open repository or
of the repository identified by the -R or --repository option.

   fossil branch new BRANCH-NAME BASIS ?-bgcolor COLOR?

       Create a new branch BRANCH-NAME off of check-in BASIS.
       You can optionally give the branch a default color.

   fossil branch list

       List all branches

<hr><a href="#tof">&#710;</a>
    <a name="cgi">Usage: </a><a href="cmd_cgi.wiki">fossil cgi</a> SCRIPT
    The SCRIPT argument is the name of a file that is the CGI script
    that is being run.  The command name, "cgi", may be omitted if
    the GATEWAY_INTERFACE environment variable is set to "CGI" (which
    should always be the case for CGI scripts run by a webserver.)  The