A WIM file may be either stand-alone or split into multiple parts.
- WINDOWS PE
-
-A major use for this library is to create customized images of Windows PE, the
-Windows Preinstallation Environment, without having to rely on Windows. Windows
-PE is a lightweight version of Windows that can run entirely from memory and can
-be used to install Windows from local media or a network drive or perform
-maintenance. Windows PE is the operating system that runs when you boot from
-the Windows installation media.
-
-You can find Windows PE on the installation DVD for Windows Vista, Windows 7, or
-Windows 8, in the file `sources/boot.wim'. Windows PE can also be found in the
-Windows Automated Installation Kit (WAIK), which is free to download from
-Microsoft, inside the `WinPE.cab' file, which you can extract if you install
-either the `cabextract' or `p7zip' programs.
-
-In addition, Windows installations and recovery partitions frequently contain a
-WIM containing an image of the Windows Recovery Environment, which is similar to
-Windows PE.
-
- NTFS SUPPORT
-
-As of version 1.0.0, wimlib supports capturing and applying images directly to
-NTFS volumes. This was made possible with the help of libntfs-3g from the
-NTFS-3g project. This feature supports capturing and restoring NTFS-specific
-data such as security descriptors, alternate data streams, and reparse point
-data.
-
-The code for NTFS image capture and image application is complete enough that it
-is possible to apply an image from the "install.wim" contained in recent Windows
-installation media (Vista, Windows 7, or Windows 8) directly to a NTFS volume,
-and then boot Windows from it after preparing the Boot Configuration Data. In
-addition, a Windows installation can be captured (or backed up) into a WIM file,
-and then re-applied later.
-
PROGRAMS
wimlib provides a public API for other programs to use, but also comes with two
`mkwinpeimg' is shell script that makes it easy to create a customized bootable
image of Windows PE that can be put on a CD or USB drive, or published on a
-server for PXE booting. See the main page `doc/mkwinpeiso.1' for more details.
+server for PXE booting. See the main page `doc/mkwinpeimg.1' for more details.
COMPRESSION RATIO
wimlib imagex (v1.0.3): 19 sec 30 sec
Microsoft imagex.exe: 25 sec 89 sec
+ NTFS SUPPORT
+
+As of version 1.0.0, wimlib supports capturing and applying images directly to
+NTFS volumes. This was made possible with the help of libntfs-3g from the
+NTFS-3g project. This feature supports capturing and restoring NTFS-specific
+data such as security descriptors, alternate data streams, and reparse point
+data.
+
+The code for NTFS image capture and image application is complete enough that it
+is possible to apply an image from the "install.wim" contained in recent Windows
+installation media (Vista, Windows 7, or Windows 8) directly to a NTFS volume,
+and then boot Windows from it after preparing the Boot Configuration Data. In
+addition, a Windows installation can be captured (or backed up) into a WIM file,
+and then re-applied later.
+
+ WINDOWS PE
+
+A major use for this library is to create customized images of Windows PE, the
+Windows Preinstallation Environment, without having to rely on Windows. Windows
+PE is a lightweight version of Windows that can run entirely from memory and can
+be used to install Windows from local media or a network drive or perform
+maintenance. Windows PE is the operating system that runs when you boot from
+the Windows installation media.
+
+You can find Windows PE on the installation DVD for Windows Vista, Windows 7, or
+Windows 8, in the file `sources/boot.wim'. Windows PE can also be found in the
+Windows Automated Installation Kit (WAIK), which is free to download from
+Microsoft, inside the `WinPE.cab' file, which you can extract if you install
+either the `cabextract' or `p7zip' programs.
+
+In addition, Windows installations and recovery partitions frequently contain a
+WIM containing an image of the Windows Recovery Environment, which is similar to
+Windows PE.
DEPENDENCIES
-* libxml2
+* libxml2 (required)
This is a commonly used free library to read and write XML files. You
likely already have it installed as a dependency for some other program.
For more information see http://xmlsoft.org/.
-* libfuse
+* libfuse (optional but highly recommended)
Unless configured with --without-fuse, wimlib requires a non-ancient
version of libfuse to be installed. Most GNU/Linux distributions
already include this, but make sure you have the libfuse package
a WIM file. For more information see http://fuse.sourceforge.net/.
FUSE is also available for FreeBSD.
-* libntfs-3g
+* libntfs-3g (optional but highly recommended)
Unless configured with --without-ntfs-3g, wimlib requires the library
and headers for libntfs-3g version 2011-4-12 or later to be installed.
Versions dated 2010-3-6 and earlier do not work because they are missing
the header xattrs.h (and the file xattrs.c, which contains functions we
need).
+* OpenSSL / libcrypto (optional)
+ wimlib can use the SHA1 message digest code from OpenSSL instead of
+ compiling in yet another SHA1 implementation. (See LICENSE section.)
+
* cdrkit (optional)
* mtools (optional)
* syslinux (optional)
(http://www.syslinux.org). Retrieving files from the Windows Automated
Installation Kit requires `cabextract' (http://www.cabextract.org.uk).
-
CONFIGURATION
Besides the various well-known options, the following options can be passed to
wimlib's `configure' script:
--without-ntfs-3g
- If libntfs-3g is not available or is not the correct version, we can
- build without it. wimlib will then not be able to apply or capture
+ If libntfs-3g is not available or is not version 2011-4-12 or later, we
+ can build without it. wimlib will then not be able to apply or capture
images directly to NTFS volumes.
--without-fuse
--disable-assertions
Remove all assertions. Without this option, wimlib will abort() the
program if an assertion fails. An assertion failure should only occur
- if there is a bug in wimlib.
+ if there is a bug in the library.
--enable-debug
Include debugging messages. Only use this option if you have found a
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.
+By default, wimlib will be linked to the system library "libcrypto", which
+probably will be OpenSSL. Some people believe that GPL code cannot be linked to
+OpenSSL without a linking exception. As far as I know, I cannot officially
+include a linking exception with the license of this library because several
+files could be considered derived works of LGPL code copyrighted by others. If
+you believe this to be a problem, configure with --without-libcrypto to avoid
+linking with OpenSSL. There is no difference in functionality--- there will
+just be stand-alone SHA1 message digest code built into the library.
+
DISCLAIMER
wimlib is experimental. Use Microsoft's `imagex.exe' if you want to make sure
git://wimlib.net / wimlib / blobdiff