INTRODUCTION
-This is wimlib version 1.7.0-BETA (May 2014). wimlib is a C library for
+This is wimlib version 1.7.0-BETA (June 2014). wimlib is a C library for
creating, modifying, extracting, and mounting files in the Windows Imaging
Format (WIM files). These files are normally created using the ImageX
(imagex.exe) or Dism (Dism.exe) utilities on Windows, but wimlib is distributed
http://www.tuxera.com/community/ntfs-3g-download/ for more information.
The LZX decompressor (lzx-decompress.c) was originally based on code from the
-cabextract project (http://www.cabextract.org.uk) but has been rewritten.
+cabextract project (http://www.cabextract.org.uk). The LZX compressor
+(lzx-compress.c) was originally based on code written by Matthew Russotto
+(www.russotto.net/chm/). However I have since rewritten and made many
+improvements to both the decompressor and compressor.
-The LZX compressor (lzx-compress.c) was originally based on code written by
-Matthew Russotto (www.russotto.net/chm/) but has been rewritten. It now uses
-suffix array construction code from divsufsort
-(https://code.google.com/p/libdivsufsort/) and algorithms from 7-Zip as well as
-several published papers.
+lz_hash.c contains LZ77 match-finding code that uses hash chains. It is based
+on code from zlib but I have since rewritten it.
-lz_hash.c contains a hash-table-based LZ77 matchfinder that is based on code
-from zlib but has been rewritten. This code is applicable to XPRESS, LZX, and
-LZMS, all of which are partly based on LZ77 compression.
+lz_bt.c contains LZ77 match-finding code that uses binary trees. It is based on
+code from liblzma but I have since rewritten it.
A limited number of other free programs can handle some parts of the WIM
file format:
other archive formats). However, wimlib is designed specifically to handle
WIM files and provides features previously only available in Microsoft's
implementation, such as the ability to mount WIMs read-write as well as
- read-only, the ability to create LZX or XPRESS compressed WIMs, and the
- correct handling of security descriptors and hard links.
+ read-only, the ability to create compressed WIMs, and the correct handling
+ of security descriptors and hard links.
* ImagePyX (https://github.com/maxpat78/ImagePyX) is a Python program that
provides similar capabilities to wimlib-imagex. One thing to note, though,
is that it does not support compression and decompression by itself, but
instead relies on external native code, such as the codecs from wimlib.
-A very early version of wimlib is being used to deploy Windows 7 from the
-Ultimate Deployment Appliance. For more information see
-http://www.ultimatedeployment.org/.
+If you are looking for an archive format that provides features similar to WIM
+but was designed primarily for UNIX, you may want to consider SquashFS
+(http://squashfs.sourceforge.net/). However, you may find that wimlib works
+surprisingly well on UNIX. It will store hard links and symbolic links, and it
+has optional support for storing UNIX owners, groups, modes, and special files
+such as device nodes and FIFOs. Actually, I use it to back up my own files on
+Linux!
-If you are looking for a UNIX archive format that provides features similar to
-WIM, I recommend you take a look at SquashFS (http://squashfs.sourceforge.net/).
+ LICENSE AND DISCLAIMER
- LICENSE
-
-As of version 1.0.0, wimlib and all programs and scripts distributed with it are
-released under the GNU GPL version 3.0 or later. See COPYING for details.
-Some individual source files are also released under more permissive licenses.
+See COPYING for information about the license.
wimlib is independently developed and does not contain any code, data, or files
copyrighted by Microsoft. It is not known to be affected by any patents.
implementation with built-in code and there will be no difference in
functionality.
- DISCLAIMER
-
wimlib comes with no warranty whatsoever. Please submit a bug report (to
ebiggers3@gmail.com) if you find a bug in wimlib and/or wimlib-imagex.