Manifest Management

Stamp stores your intended package state in manifest.toml. Before rewriting it on re-init or reconcile, stamp keeps a timestamped backup (manifest.toml.<YYYYMMDDTHHMMSSZ>.bak). Because the manifest is a local file — not tracked by git — stamp manifest history and stamp manifest diff are the only way to see what changed and which backup to restore from.

History

stamp manifest history lists the current manifest and every backup, newest first, with package/repo counts and a short content hash.

stamp manifest history

Available manifest backups:
  * 2026-08-04T12:00:00Z  3fa9c21e4b12  145 packages, 14 repos  (current)
    2026-08-03T18:30:00Z  8d2f00a1c9e3  142 packages, 12 repos
    2026-08-02T09:15:00Z  6b1e44c90aa7  38 packages, 8 repos
    2026-07-28T14:00:00Z  12ba0ef341dd  35 packages, 6 repos  (unchanged)

• * marks the current manifest
• The hash is the first 12 hex characters of each file’s SHA-256 — copy it to use with stamp manifest diff
• (unchanged) marks a backup whose content is identical to the current manifest — a good candidate for pruning

stamp manifest history -j

[
  {"timestamp": "2026-08-04T12:00:00Z", "hash": "3fa9c21e4b12", "current": true, "packages": 145, "repos": 14},
  {"timestamp": "2026-08-03T18:30:00Z", "hash": "8d2f00a1c9e3", "current": false, "packages": 142, "repos": 12}
]

Diff

stamp manifest diff shows what changed between the current manifest and a backup. It defaults to the most recent backup. The argument may be a timestamp or a content-hash prefix from history.

stamp manifest diff
stamp manifest diff 2026-08-02T09:15:00Z
stamp manifest diff a1b2c3d4e5f6

Comparing: current vs 2026-08-03T18:30:00Z

+ htop (dnf)
+ lazygit (brew)
- NetworkManager (dnf)
- gnome-shell (dnf)

  2 added, 2 removed

+ means present in the current manifest but not the backup; - means present in the backup but removed since. Both packages and repositories are compared, using name + manager as the identity key.

Filters compose with --manager, -m and --origin:

stamp manifest diff --origin stamped
stamp manifest diff -m brew
stamp manifest diff -m brew --origin reconciled -j

{
  "baseline": "2026-08-03T18:30:00Z",
  "added": [
    {"name": "htop", "manager": "dnf", "origin": "stamped", "kind": "package"}
  ],
  "removed": [
    {"name": "old-repo", "manager": "dnf", "origin": "stamped", "kind": "repo"}
  ]
}

Restoring from a backup

history and diff help you pick the right backup. To roll the manifest back, copy a backup over the live manifest (or use stamp restore after editing). Backup filenames use the compact timestamp form, e.g. for the backup shown as 2026-08-02T09:15:00Z in history:

cp ~/.config/stamp/manifest.toml.20260802T091500Z.bak ~/.config/stamp/manifest.toml

The next stamp restore rebuilds your environment from that state.

Understanding origins

Every entry’s origin records how stamp learned about it — stamped (installed via stamp install) or reconciled (discovered by stamp reconcile). See Listing Packages for details.