Software remastering is

software development Software development is the process of designing and Implementation, implementing a software solution to Computer user satisfaction, satisfy a User (computing), user. The process is more encompassing than Computer programming, programming, wri ...

that recreates

system software System software is software designed to provide a platform for other software. An example of system software is an operating system (OS) (like macOS, Linux, Android, and Microsoft Windows). Application software is software that allows users to d ...

and

applications Application may refer to: Mathematics and computing * Application software, computer software designed to help the user to perform specific tasks ** Application layer, an abstraction layer that specifies protocols and interface methods used in a ...

while incorporating customizations, with the intent that it is copied and run elsewhere for "off-label" usage. The term comes from ''remastering'' in media production, where it is similarly distinguished from mere

copying Copying is the duplication of information or an wiktionary:artifact, artifact based on an instance of that information or artifact, and not using the process that originally generated it. With Analog device, analog forms of information, copying is ...

. If the

codebase In software development, a codebase (or code base) is a collection of source code used to build a particular software system, application, or software component. Typically, a codebase includes only human-written source code system files; thu ...

does not continue to parallel an ongoing, upstream software development, then it is a

fork In cutlery or kitchenware, a fork (from 'pitchfork') is a utensil, now usually made of metal, whose long handle terminates in a head that branches into several narrow and often slightly curved tines with which one can spear foods either to h ...

, not a remastered version. If a codebase replicates the behaviour of the original but does not derive from the original codebase then it is a clone. KnoppixFamilyTree1210

Common examples of software remastering include

Linux Linux ( ) is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an kernel (operating system), operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically package manager, pac ...

and

Unix-like A Unix-like (sometimes referred to as UN*X, *nix or *NIX) operating system is one that behaves in a manner similar to a Unix system, although not necessarily conforming to or being certified to any version of the Single UNIX Specification. A Uni ...

distributions, and video games. Remastered Linux, BSD and OpenSolaris operating system distributions are common because they are not

copy protected Copy protection, also known as content protection, copy prevention and copy restriction, is any measure to enforce copyright by preventing the reproduction of software, films, music, and other media. Copy protection is most commonly found on vid ...

, but also because of the allowance of such operating systems to grow an application for taking a ''

snapshot Snapshot, snapshots or snap shot may refer to: * Snapshot (photography), a photograph taken without preparation Computing * Snapshot (computer storage), the state of a system at a particular point in time * Snapshot (file format) or SNP, a file ...

'' of itself, and of installing that onto bootable media such as a

thumb drive A flash drive (also thumb drive, memory stick, and pen drive/pendrive) is a data storage device that includes flash memory with an integrated USB interface. A typical USB drive is removable, rewritable, and smaller than an optical disc, and u ...

or a virtual machine in a

hypervisor A hypervisor, also known as a virtual machine monitor (VMM) or virtualizer, is a type of computer software, firmware or hardware that creates and runs virtual machines. A computer on which a hypervisor runs one or more virtual machines is called ...

. Since 2001 over 1000 computer operating systems have arisen for download from the Internet. A global community of

providers pushes the practice of remastering by developer switching, project overtaking or merging, and by sharing over the Internet. Most distributions start as a remastered version of another distribution as evidenced by the announcements made at

DistroWatch DistroWatch is a website that provides news, distribution pages hit rankings, and other general information about various Linux distributions as well as other free software/open source Unix-like operating systems. It now contains information on ...

. Notably, remastering SLS Linux forked

Slackware Slackware is a Linux distribution created by Patrick Volkerding in 1993. Originally based on Softlanding Linux System (SLS), Slackware has been the basis for many other Linux distributions, most notably the first versions of SUSE Linux distr ...

, remastering

Red Hat Linux Red Hat Linux was a widely used commercial open-source Linux distribution created by Red Hat until its discontinuation in 2004. Early releases of Red Hat Linux were called Red Hat Commercial Linux. Red Hat published the first non-beta release ...

helped fork

Yellow Dog Linux Yellow Dog Linux (YDL) is a discontinued free and open-source operating system for high-performance computing on multi-core processor computer architectures, focusing on GPU systems and computers using the POWER7 processor. The original develop ...

and

Mandriva Mandriva S.A. was a Public company, public software company specializing in Linux and open-source software. Its corporate headquarters was in Paris, and it had development centers in Metz, France and Curitiba, Brazil. Mandriva, S.A. was the deve ...

and

TurboLinux Turbolinux is a discontinued Japanese Linux distribution targeting Asian users. Linux distribution The Turbolinux distribution was created as a rebranded Red Hat distribution by (then) Pacific HiTech employee Scott Stone. Scott was the lead rele ...

, and by remastering a

Debian Debian () is a free and open-source software, free and open source Linux distribution, developed by the Debian Project, which was established by Ian Murdock in August 1993. Debian is one of the oldest operating systems based on the Linux kerne ...

distribution,

Ubuntu Ubuntu ( ) is a Linux distribution based on Debian and composed primarily of free and open-source software. Developed by the British company Canonical (company), Canonical and a community of contributors under a Meritocracy, meritocratic gover ...

was started, which is itself remastered by the

Linux Mint Linux Mint is a community-developed Linux distribution. It is based on Ubuntu and designed for x86-64 based computers; another variant is based on Debian which is named Linux Mint Debian Edition (LMDE) and has both 64-bit and IA-32 support. T ...

team. These might involve critical system software, but the extent of the customizations made in remastering can be as trivial as a change in a default setting of the distribution and subsequent provision to an acquaintance on installation media. When a remastered version becomes ''public'' it becomes a ''distribution''.

Microsoft Windows Windows is a Product lining, product line of Proprietary software, proprietary graphical user interface, graphical operating systems developed and marketed by Microsoft. It is grouped into families and subfamilies that cater to particular sec ...

has also been modified and remastered. Various utilities exist that combine Windows updates and

device drivers In the context of an operating system, a device driver is a computer program that operates or controls a particular type of device that is attached to a computer or automaton. A driver provides a software interface to hardware devices, enabli ...

with the original Windows CD/DVD installation media, a process known as

slipstreaming Drafting or slipstreaming is an aerodynamic technique where two moving objects are aligning in a close group to exploit the lead object's slipstream and thus reduce the overall effect of drag. Especially when high speeds are involved, as in mo ...

. When remastering a distro, remastering software can be applied from the "inside" of a live operating system to clone itself into an installation package. Remastering does not necessarily require the remastering software, which only facilitates the process. For example, an application is remastered just by acquiring, modifying and recompiling its original source code. Many

video games A video game or computer game is an electronic game that involves interaction with a user interface or input device (such as a joystick, game controller, controller, computer keyboard, keyboard, or motion sensing device) to generate visual fe ...

have been modded by upgrading them with additional content, levels, or features. Notably, ''

Counter-Strike ''Counter-Strike'' (''CS'') is a series of multiplayer tactical first-person shooter video games, in which opposing teams attempt to complete various objectives. The series began on Windows in 1999 with the release of the first game, '' Counte ...

'' was remastered from ''

Half-Life Half-life is a mathematical and scientific description of exponential or gradual decay. Half-life, half life or halflife may also refer to: Film * Half-Life (film), ''Half-Life'' (film), a 2008 independent film by Jennifer Phang * ''Half Life: ...

'' and went on to be marketed as a commercial product.

Introduction

Software remastering creates an application by rebuilding its code base from the software objects on an existing master repository. If the "mastering" process assembles a distribution for the release of a version, the remaster process does the same but with subtraction, modification, or addition to the master repository. Similarly a modified

makefile In software development, Make is a command-line interface software tool that performs actions ordered by configured Dependence analysis, dependencies as defined in a configuration file called a ''makefile''. It is commonly used for build automati ...

orchestrates a computerized version of an application. When an amount of unneeded code is "cut down" to some wanted minimum it removes unwanted features that the original publisher and maintainer needs. When new features are added it evolves the software. A remastered version may consider that a feature of the original is a bug, and provides a modified copy of the feature that works in a better way. When it is published a software remaster maintains the integrity of the named product from which it was derived by adherence to a shared software repository with any modifications, and with the intention of maintaining the good name needing approval. If approval does not happen, the name and the repository have the option to become their own master. The creator of a published software remaster, if they do no further work to evolve the software, must at least arrange for maintenance support channels, such as updating user documentation, providing a forum, an internet relay chat line, or a wiki, providing intent to maintain a version for the life of its usefulness. Remastering centers around the reputation of a product, and so the distribution process requires an official, sanctioned version. This differs from the attitude in much

free software Free software, libre software, libreware sometimes known as freedom-respecting software is computer software distributed open-source license, under terms that allow users to run the software for any purpose as well as to study, change, distribut ...

in the many cases where the name of the product is "cheap" because plentiful and stable, where no guarantees or liabilities are offered, and where permission is inherently granted to redistribution any modified version under any name. The original repository is the master, from which creative flavors and spins may already be offered by the original producers. A remaster production supports any additional software from outside it, supports the new mixture of software from the original repository, or keeps the modifications of original masters on the outside the master repository. Software remastering is ''tolerated'' by the maintainers of the master repository, while free software modifications are ''encouraged'' by the same social conventions.

Linux

Mklivecd mklivecd is a script for Linux distributions that allows for one to compile a "snapshot" of the current hard drive partition and all data which resides in it (all settings, applications, documents, bookmarks, etc.) and compress it into an ISO 9660 ...

runs on a Linux machine to make a bootable, portable media, image of that Linux system. It works for any

Linux distribution A Linux distribution, often abbreviated as distro, is an operating system that includes the Linux kernel for its kernel functionality. Although the name does not imply product distribution per se, a distro—if distributed on its own—is oft ...

, but probably needs to be installed first.

PCLinuxOS

A ''remaster'' is a personalized version of PCLinuxOS created according to the needs of an individual. It is created using the

mklivecd mklivecd is a script for Linux distributions that allows for one to compile a "snapshot" of the current hard drive partition and all data which resides in it (all settings, applications, documents, bookmarks, etc.) and compress it into an ISO 9660 ...

script applied to its installation, which can be of any of the ''official'' flavors of PCLinuxOS. An ''official remaster'' can only include software and components from the official

repository (version control) In version control systems, a repository is a data structure that stores metadata for a set of files or directory structure. Depending on whether the version control system in use is distributed, like Git or Mercurial, or centralized, like Sub ...

. A ''community remaster'' may contain software and components from outside but if so, then it should not have any reference to PCLinuxOS other than "derived from PCLinuxOS" or "based on PCLinuxOS" if intended for

distribution Distribution may refer to: Mathematics *Distribution (mathematics), generalized functions used to formulate solutions of partial differential equations *Probability distribution, the probability of a particular value or value range of a varia ...

. There have been several of these third-party distributions over the years, though they may only mention that connection if they follow strict guidelines concerning the quality, maintainability and distribution channels, all subject to approval from officiating members of the forum. ''PCLinuxOS Gnome Edition'' is an example of a ''community remaster''.

Unity Linux

Unity Linux is intended as a base platform that acts as a distribution "template" that ensures interoperability between packages, and upon which one is encouraged to remaster any "all new" Linux OS distributions.

Linux Mint

Linux Mint has its own remastering tool called ''mintConstructor'' for creating distributions based on Linux Mint, and for creating ISO files. Also, the package manager uses .mint files. Linux Mint is based on the Ubuntu Linux distribution, but Ubuntu is based on the Debian distribution. Because Linux Mint also offers a Debian Edition, they provide an example of meeting the kind of

challenges that goes into remastering a branch of two distributions.

Others

Gentoo Linux Gentoo Linux (pronounced ) is a Linux distribution built using the Portage package management system. Unlike a binary software distribution, the source code is compiled locally according to the user's preferences and is often optimized for ...

uses ''Catalyst''. The user installs it and configures it, and after it runs, gets one big archive-formatted file under /var/tmp/catalyst/builds. Configuration options are the target machine architecture, development version stamp, a differentiation stamp (for example the same version but "hardened" for extra security). The user must provide Catalyst its own snapshot of his portage tree and point it to a target "profile" branch of the portage tree. (A

portage Portage or portaging ( CA: ; ) is the practice of carrying water craft or cargo over land, either around an obstacle in a river, or between two bodies of water. A path where items are regularly carried between bodies of water is also called a '' ...

tree is a hierarchy of directories, oriented by the names and categories of packages, that some package managers use for the normal everyday maintenance of software.)

Fedora Linux Fedora Linux is a Linux distribution developed by the Fedora Project. It was originally developed in 2003 as a continuation of the Red Hat Linux project. It contains software distributed under various free and open-source licenses and aims to b ...

uses ''Revisor'' to enable the user to compose his own customized installation or live media.

Arch Linux Arch Linux () is an Open-source software, open source, rolling release Linux distribution. Arch Linux is kept up-to-date by regularly updating the individual pieces of software that it comprises. Arch Linux is intentionally minimal, and is meant ...

uses ''Archiso'' to remaster an Arch installation to target a machine which has rare hardware or no Internet connection, or for cases where a modified deployment will occur multiple times. The remastered ISOs are bootable, so they can also be used for system rescue, demonstrations of the Arch setup, as a task for testing some new software installed on it, a rollout of a custom installation onto many machines, etc. The Arch Linux wiki also gives the procedure to do manually what Archiso does automatically. (It involves copying portions of the installation ISO, and using the Linux commands mount, mkdir, chroot, mksquashfs, and the Arch package manager pacman.)

MX Linux MX Linux is a Linux distribution based on Debian stable and using core antiX components, with additional software created or packaged by the MX community. The development of MX Linux is a collaborative effort between the antiX and former MEPIS c ...

uses ''MX-snapshot'', a GUI tool, to remaster a live installation into a single .ISO file. This quickly and conveniently "cloned" image is bootable from disk or USB-thumbdrive while maintaining all settings. This way, an installation can conveniently migrated or distributed to a new hard-disk or USB-thumbdrive requiring next to no administrative effort, since an advanced method of copying the file system (developed by antiX-linux) utilizing bind-mounts performs the "heavy lifting". The snapshot also serves as an essentially complete and convenient backup of the installation.

Microsoft Windows

The examples in this section show some historical and operational aspects of the software remastering as it has occurred with Microsoft Windows.

Windows 9x

98lite

98lite is a remastering tool for

Windows 95 Windows 95 is a consumer-oriented operating system developed by Microsoft and the first of its Windows 9x family of operating systems, released to manufacturing on July 14, 1995, and generally to retail on August 24, 1995. Windows 95 merged ...

Windows 98 Windows 98 is a consumer-oriented operating system developed by Microsoft as part of its Windows 9x family of Microsoft Windows operating systems. It was the second operating system in the 9x line, as the successor to Windows 95. It was Software ...

and

Windows Me Windows Me (Millennium Edition) is an operating system developed by Microsoft as part of its Windows 9x family of Microsoft Windows operating systems. It was the successor to Windows 98, and was released to manufacturing on June 19, 2000, and t ...

without

Internet Explorer Internet Explorer (formerly Microsoft Internet Explorer and Windows Internet Explorer, commonly abbreviated as IE or MSIE) is a deprecation, retired series of graphical user interface, graphical web browsers developed by Microsoft that were u ...

, written by Shane Brooks. It was written in response to Microsoft's claim, in antitrust proceedings, that IE is integrated into Windows and cannot be removed without breaking other features. 98lite was created in 1998 after the original release of

, out of necessity, since at the time Brooks had a slower

laptop A laptop computer or notebook computer, also known as a laptop or notebook, is a small, portable personal computer (PC). Laptops typically have a Clamshell design, clamshell form factor (design), form factor with a flat-panel computer scree ...

computer that ran the

operating system fine but Windows 98 was simply too slow. Brooks liked the stability Windows 98 offered as well as some of the new features but had no need for the

browser. The original 98lite was a simple DOS based installer that ran before the Windows 98 installation, this installer made modifications to a fresh installation of Windows preventing the installation of Internet Explorer and the Active Desktop. Installation of the first release of 98lite required the user to extract certain files from a Windows 95 disk as 98lite uses the Windows 95 shell. A second program called ''Shell Swap'' swapped the Explorer shell with the Windows 95 Explorer, which does not contain the web features of Me's and 98's Explorer and is therefore considerably faster and more lightweight, this was designed for existing installations of Windows 98 where the original 98lite was designed for a new installation of Windows. A third program converted "required" components into addable and removable options. With version 2.0 of 98lite, the three programs were merged and combined into a single program. The IE remover was combined with the components converter, making IE uninstallable and reinstallable with the Add/Remove Programs control panel applet as with the other components; the user could also choose the Windows 95 shell and keep Internet Explorer installed. The user now had three installation options. The "sleek" option allowed the user to install 98lite with the Windows 95 shell like in the original release, or the user could choose "chubby", which used the Windows 98 shell with some Active Desktop features disabled. The final option was "overweight", which installed 98lite with the Windows 98 shell and nothing disabled but Internet Explorer still removed. Version 3.0 added support for Windows 98 Second Edition, an upgraded version of Windows 98 with Internet Explorer 5.0 which made 98lite 1.0 through 2.0 obsolete. The current 4.x line has many improvements, including bugfixes and support for

. Installing any version of DirectX under 98lited Windows requires at least temporary presence of PC Health. Otherwise DirectX refuses to install, finishing installation attempt with error message "DirectX did not copy a required file".

Revenge of Mozilla

Revenge of Mozilla is another free application that removes Internet Explorer and many other non-essential components from Windows 98 and restores the Windows 95 explorer.exe. There are two versions of this, one for the original Windows 98 release, and another for Win98 SE; there is no version for Windows Me. This is no longer supported, and not being updated.

Embedded

There is also a company spun off from Lite-PC that produces Windows 98 and Me installations which are small enough to easily fit on embedded microchips, as small as 8MB, using 98EOS. There are also many free alternatives to this, such as Mindows and Nano98, which can provide either smaller file sizes, or more broad functionality.

Windows 2000 and later

2000-XPLite

The creator of 98lite also built a similar tool for

Windows 2000 Windows 2000 is a major release of the Windows NT operating system developed by Microsoft, targeting the server and business markets. It is the direct successor to Windows NT 4.0, and was Software release life cycle#Release to manufacturing (RT ...

and

Windows XP Windows XP is a major release of Microsoft's Windows NT operating system. It was released to manufacturing on August 24, 2001, and later to retail on October 25, 2001. It is a direct successor to Windows 2000 for high-end and business users a ...

, called 2000-XPLite, which removes Windows components that are not intended to be removable. This includes

Out-Of-Box Experience An out-of-box experience (OOBE ( )) is the experience an end-user has when taking a product after unboxing, or for digital distribution, runs the Installation (computer programs)#Installer, installer, and is preparing to first use it, as opposed t ...

Outlook Express Outlook Express, formerly known as Microsoft Internet Mail and News, is a discontinued email and news client included with Internet Explorer versions 3.0 to 6.0. As such, it was bundled with several versions of Microsoft Windows, from Windows ...

Windows Media Player Windows Media Player (WMP, officially referred to as Windows Media Player Legacy to retronym, distinguish it from Windows Media Player (2022), the new Windows Media Player introduced with Windows 11) is the first media player (application soft ...

, and others. 2000-XPLite also allows tweaks to the Operating System to enhance its performance. 2000-XPLite does not use a text interface as did 98lite. Like 98lite, 2000-XPlite installs Windows with all components, and then removes unwanted components after installation.

nLite

nLite is designed to remove unwanted

(32 and 64 bit) and

Windows Server 2003 Windows Server 2003, codenamed "Whistler Server", is the sixth major version of the Windows NT operating system produced by Microsoft and the first server version to be released under the Windows Server brand name. It is part of the Windows NT ...

system components, and create cut-down customized installation CDs. nLite was built by Dino Nuhagić and is free for personal use with purchase options available. In September 2014, a beta-version for

Windows 7 Windows 7 is a major release of the Windows NT operating system developed by Microsoft. It was Software release life cycle#Release to manufacturing (RTM), released to manufacturing on July 22, 2009, and became generally available on October 22, ...

and later was publicly released. After the user chooses the wanted 'functionality' options, nLite attempts to warn the user against removing dependent components during the creation of a custom installer. It also lets users add device drivers, integrate Service Packs and other Windows Updates as well as remove drivers for obsolete or unwanted hardware and remove unwanted language and keyboard options and unwanted applications. It allows customization of the installation process, including Product Key entry, administrator's password, regional settings and creating user account names and other options normally set in Control Panel after installation, as well as numerous 'tweaks'. Various degrees of 'unattended installation' are also possible. At the end of the installer creation process, nLite can burn the installation direct to CD, or create an .

iso image An optical disc image (or ISO image, from the ISO 9660 file system used with CD-ROM media) is a disk image that contains everything that would be written to an optical disc, disk sector by disc sector, including the optical disc file system. IS ...

for later use. It also has the option of saving and loading previous session choices,'' (in .txt format)'' to speed up checking or further modification of the custom installation, should that be required. Since the custom installer does not contain unwanted components, this can lead to a smaller installation package and faster installation, which is of considerable benefit to IT Staff still using a manual 'roll out' approach (without the benefit of Microsoft

Sysprep Sysprep is Microsoft's System Preparation Tool for Microsoft Windows operating system deployment. History Sysprep was originally introduced for use with Windows NT 4.0. Later versions introduced for Windows 2000, Windows XP and Windows Server ...

). Such software-minimized CDs can also allow a Windows system to be installed on hard disks below 512 MB in size.

HFSLIP

HFSLIP is an

open source Open source is source code that is made freely available for possible modification and redistribution. Products include permission to use and view the source code, design documents, or content of the product. The open source model is a decentrali ...

command line

Hotfix A hotfix is a software update that is released outside the normal update cycle or intended to be applied to a live system; often to fix a bug. Originally, ''hotfix'' referred to patching a ''hot'' system a production server that is actively ser ...

and

Service Pack In computing, a service pack comprises a collection of updates, fixes, or enhancements to a software program delivered in the form of a single installable package. Companies often release a service pack when the number of individual patches to a ...

slipstreaming tool designed to update Windows 2000, Windows XP, and Windows Server 2003 installation sources. In addition to hotfixes and service packs, HFSLIP slipstreams other Microsoft updates such as

DirectX Microsoft DirectX is a collection of application programming interfaces (APIs) for handling tasks related to multimedia, especially game programming and video, on Microsoft platforms. Originally, the names of these APIs all began with "Direct" ...

9.0c,

, and Windows Media Codecs. It also integrates third-party

device driver In the context of an operating system, a device driver is a computer program that operates or controls a particular type of device that is attached to a computer or automaton. A driver provides a software interface to hardware devices, enabli ...

updates, including DriverPacks. HFSLIP slipstreams (replaces) the original files with the newer versions found in the updates from the Microsoft Download Center. HFSLIP places hotfixes that were non-standard or required a special installation procedure in the SVCPACK folder, to be installed automatically near the end of Windows setup. As of May 2010, HFSLIP is no longer being developed, and the main website was taken down.

Autostreamer

Autostreamer is a free slipstreaming tool for Windows XP, which can integrate a

service pack In computing, a service pack comprises a collection of updates, fixes, or enhancements to a software program delivered in the form of a single installable package. Companies often release a service pack when the number of individual patches to a ...

into a Windows XP installation CD-ROM image. The main interface of Autostreamer is a wizard which guides the user through the slipstreaming process. According to ''

PC World ''PC World'' (stylized as PCWorld) is a global computer magazine published monthly by IDG. Since 2013, it has been an online-only publication. It offers advice on various aspects of PCs and related items, the Internet, and other personal tec ...

'', it "simplifies the once-intimidating chore of slipstreaming your Windows XP CD—producing an XP SP2 CD from your SP1 or even vintage original XP CD".

DriverPacks

The DriverPacks project is an

project started by Wim Leers and Jeff Herre. Leers released the first Pack in 2005. Collections of device drivers are called ''DriverPacks''. These exist for CPU Chipsets, CPU, Graphics/Video, Ethernet, Mass Storage/Removable/USB, Audio/Sound and Wireless (Wi-Fi/WLAN) hardware. DriverPacks BASE is a tool that integrates all DriverPacks into one, "uniform" Windows installation CD, which works on every piece of hardware, and needs no additional

after the installation. It is compatible with all Windows versions based on the NT 5.x 32-bit kernel (Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Server 2003.

Windows Vista

vLite

vLite is the

Windows Vista Windows Vista is a major release of the Windows NT operating system developed by Microsoft. It was the direct successor to Windows XP, released five years earlier, which was then the longest time span between successive releases of Microsoft W ...

(32 and 64 bit) version of nLite, that can create a cut-down customized installation CD (or bootable USB stick). Some people have reported success using vLite with

; vLite is not fully compatible with Windows 7 and was not intended to support Windows 7. In Sept. 2014, ntLite was released to support Windows 7 and later.

Windows 7 and later

ntLite

ntLite is a software tool from the creator of nLite to support

Windows 8 Windows 8 is a major release of the Windows NT operating system developed by Microsoft. It was Software release life cycle#Release to manufacturing (RTM), released to manufacturing on August 1, 2012, made available for download via Microsoft ...

Windows 8.1 Windows 8.1 is a release of the Windows NT operating system developed by Microsoft. It was released to manufacturing on August 27, 2013, and broadly released for retail sale on October 17, 2013, about a year after the retail release of its pr ...

, and

Windows 10 Windows 10 is a major release of Microsoft's Windows NT operating system. The successor to Windows 8.1, it was Software release cycle#Release to manufacturing (RTM), released to manufacturing on July 15, 2015, and later to retail on July 2 ...

. ntLite also prevents components from being installed and can remove them from an already-installed system when using a paid version.

Win Toolkit

Win Toolkit can create a cut-down customized installation CD (or bootable USB stick) for Windows 7 and later versions.

References

{{Reflist, 30em

External links

Detailed Ubunto remastering example
(blogged in

English as a Second Language English as a second or foreign language refers to the use of English by individuals whose native language is different, commonly among students learning to speak and write English. Variably known as English as a foreign language (EFL), Engli ...

)
How to build your own Linux distro
from

Linux Format ''Linux Format'' was the UK's first Linux-specific magazine, and as of 2013 was the best-selling Linux title in the UK. It was also exported to many countries worldwide. It was published by Future plc (which produces a number of other computer ma ...

Lightweight remastering example

Remastering Arch Linux
from the Arch Linux wiki
Scholarly example of remastering
(

PDF Portable document format (PDF), standardized as ISO 32000, is a file format developed by Adobe Inc., Adobe in 1992 to present documents, including text formatting and images, in a manner independent of application software, computer hardware, ...

) Software distribution Linux Windows 95 Windows 98 Windows ME Windows 2000 Windows XP Windows Vista