Microsoft Open Sources Windows 7 USB/DVD Download tool

Microsoft has Open Sourced the Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tool by releasing it under the GPLv2 license. The code is now available on CodePlex, Microsoft's Open Source software project hosting repository, over at http://wudt.codeplex.com.

Details at: http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/news/2009/12/microsoft-finally-open-sources-windows-7-tool.ars

==Extract from the site===

Microsoft has open sourced the Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tool (WUDT) by releasing it under the GPLv2 license. The code is now available on CodePlex, Microsoft's Open Source software project hosting repository, over at wudt.codeplex.com. The actual installer for the tool is now again available for download at the Microsoft Store (2.59MB). 

If you've got a good memory, the size might surprise you as the closed source version of the tool was only 946KB (we kept the old installer for the sake of comparison). When we compared the two tools side-by-side, the only difference we noticed was that the "Terms of use" link is no longer present in the GUI (we didn't really expect to see much more, as the size difference is really due to the included source code). Microsoft explains that while the user experience of the tool has not changed, the install involves additional steps. For convenience, the previous installer aggregated together three additional components, which are separate freestanding executables:

• .NET Framework: WUDT is written in C# which requires the Microsoft .NET Framework to run.
• IMAPI: the tool uses IMAPI to burn DVDs.
• Bootsect.exe: this is part of the Windows 7 bits (found in \boot\) and allows a USB device to be marked as bootable.