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Guide: Installing the manifest tool

Tip: If you cannot access some of the repos referenced in this section, please contact us to request access.

The manifest tool is a cross-platform Python application that creates manifests for use with Device Management Update.

Tip: If you want to keep the manifest tool's installation isolated from your work environment, for example to protect clashing Python versions, set up a virtual environment.

Set up the manifest tool

  1. Check your version of Python; if you are using:

    • 2.7, it must be at least version 2.7.11.
    • 3.5, it must be at least version 3.5.1.

    You can use the following command to check:

    python --version
    
  2. Install the manifest tool using one of the following methods (note that they all use pip):

    • Install from GitHub over HTTPS:

      $ pip install -U git+https://github.com/ARMmbed/manifest-tool.git
      
    • Install from GitHub over SSH:

      $ pip install -U git+ssh://[email protected]/ARMmbed/manifest-tool.git
      
    • Install from a local copy of the repository:

      $ pip install .
      
  3. Check that the tool has installed correctly:

    manifest-tool -h
    

    If it has installed correctly, the output looks like this:

    usage: manifest-tool [-h] [-l {debug,info,warning,exception}] [--version]
                     {create,parse,verify,cert,init} ...
    
    Create or transform a manifest
    
    positional arguments:
      {create,parse,verify,cert,init}
        create              Create a new manifest
        parse               Parse an existing manifest
        verify              Verify an existing manifest
        cert                Create or examine a certificate
        init                Set default values for manifests
    
    optional arguments:
      -h, --help            show this help message and exit
      -l {debug,info,warning,exception}, --log-level {debug,info,warning,exception}
      --version             display the version
    

If the install fails, contact your Device Management support representatives, and ask them to give you access to the manifest-tool repository.

Tool options

  • To list the options available to the manifest tool, use the --help option:

    manifest-tool --help
    
  • To list the options available to any subcommand, use the --help option:

    manifest-tool <cmd> --help
    

Manifest tool in-depth information

If you're interested in more in-depth information about the manifest tool, see the full README file and the manifest format descriptions.