Repositories that enable fossil's `manifest` setting — fossil, althttpd, pikchr — expect `manifest`, `manifest.uuid` and `manifest.tags` in the checkout; their builds read them to stamp a version. A zit checkout could not produce them, so such a build failed or, worse, succeeded with no version embedded.

`zit open --manifest` writes them; the bare flag means `ru`, a value picks any combination of `r` (the check-in artifact), `u` (its hash) and `t` (its branch and symbolic tags). The choice is recorded in the checkout record, so every later `update` refreshes the files. Absent flag writes nothing.

The selection is explicit rather than read from the cloned repository because the two places fossil keeps it disagree and only one syncs: althttpd's versioned setting says `on`, its local config `rtu`. A checkout reading the setting could diverge from a fossil checkout carrying a local override while appearing to promise fidelity.

Contents match fossil byte for byte, including the sterilizing comment it appends to `manifest`. A tracked file of one of those names is never replaced. closed check-in: dc36496c3b user: dmestas tags: iss6