canon apply

Apply a manifest to copy/move files. Copied files are automatically registered in the database with the same content hash, so they’re immediately recognized as archived (no separate scan needed).

# Preview what would happen (fast - skips source existence checks)
canon apply manifest.toml --dry-run

# Copy files (default mode, preserves mtime/permissions on Unix)
canon apply manifest.toml

# Show per-file progress during transfer
canon apply manifest.toml --verbose

# Rename files instead of copying (Unix only, fails on cross-device)
canon apply manifest.toml --rename

# Move files: rename if same device, copy+delete if cross-device
canon apply manifest.toml --move --yes

# Only apply sources from specific roots
canon apply manifest.toml --root id:1 --root id:2
canon apply manifest.toml --root path:/path/to/source

# Allow duplicates across archives (but not within destination)
canon apply manifest.toml --allow-cross-archive-duplicates

Transfer modes:

All modes use noclobber semantics: if a destination file exists, apply aborts with an error.

Integrity validation:

During transfer, Canon validates each source file’s partial hash (first 8KB + last 8KB) to detect file corruption or modification since the manifest was generated. If validation fails, the transfer is aborted.

Root filtering:

Use --root to apply only a subset of sources from the manifest. Useful for staged application when sources are on different drives.

• --root id:N - Filter by root ID (shown in manifest as root_id)
• --root path:/path - Filter by root path (must match exactly)

Pre-flight checks (mandatory):

1. Destination collisions - If multiple sources would map to the same destination path (e.g., using {filename} when sources have duplicate names), apply aborts with an error showing which files conflict.

2. Archive conflicts - Checks if files already exist in the destination archive or other archives.

3. Excluded sources - Blocks if any sources in the manifest are marked as excluded.

Edit the manifest’s [output] section to customize the destination:

[output]
pattern = "{content.DateTimeOriginal|year}/{content.DateTimeOriginal|month}/{filename}"
base_dir = "/path/to/archive"

Pattern variables use fact keys with optional modifiers (see Pattern Expressions for the full syntax):

• {filename}, {stem}, {ext} - Filename aliases
• {hash}, {hash_short} - Content hash aliases
• {source.mtime|year}, {source.mtime|month} - File modification date
• {content.DateTimeOriginal|year} - EXIF date with modifier
• {content.Make}, {content.Model} - Any fact key