https://duggan.ie/tag/windows/ 2026-06-20T08:32:51.000Z Ross Duggan https://duggan.ie/ https://duggan.ie/favicon.ico https://duggan.ie/og-image.png All rights reserved 2026, Ross Duggan Posts tagged windows https://duggan.ie/posts/wingman-bootable-windows-1011-usb-sticks-on-macos 2026-06-20T08:32:51.000Z Ross Duggan https://duggan.ie/ <p><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">Once again found myself needing to create a bootable Windows USB stick on macOS, once again surprised at how fiddly it was.</span></p><p><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">This time, though, I made an app:</span></p><p></p><div class="app-download-card my-8 rounded-2xl border border-gray-200 dark:border-gray-700 bg-gradient-to-br from-white to-gray-50 dark:from-gray-900 dark:to-gray-950 p-6 sm:p-8 shadow-sm" data-app-name="Wingman" data-icon-url="/wingman-icon-blue.png" data-download-url="https://github.com/duggan/Wingman/releases/latest" data-tagline="A native macOS app to create bootable Windows 10/11 USB installers." data-download-label="Download for macOS" data-repo-url="https://github.com/duggan/Wingman" data-min-macos="macOS 13+" data-file-size="0.7MB"><div class="flex flex-col sm:flex-row items-center sm:items-start gap-6"><div class="shrink-0"><img src="/wingman-icon-blue.png" alt="Wingman icon" class="w-28 h-28 sm:w-32 sm:h-32 rounded-3xl shadow-lg ring-1 ring-black/5 dark:ring-white/10 bg-white m-0"></div><div class="flex-1 min-w-0 text-center sm:text-left w-full"><h3 class="text-2xl sm:text-3xl font-semibold tracking-tight text-gray-900 dark:text-gray-100 mt-0 mb-1">Wingman</h3><p class="text-base text-gray-600 dark:text-gray-400 mt-0 mb-4">A native macOS app to create bootable Windows 10/11 USB installers.</p><a href="https://github.com/duggan/Wingman/releases/latest" class="inline-flex items-center justify-center gap-2 rounded-full bg-gray-900 dark:bg-white text-white dark:text-gray-900 px-6 py-3 text-sm font-medium no-underline shadow-sm hover:bg-gray-800 dark:hover:bg-gray-100 transition-colors" rel="noopener"><svg viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="currentColor" class="w-4 h-4" aria-hidden="true"><path d="M17.05 12.04c-.03-2.83 2.31-4.19 2.42-4.26-1.32-1.93-3.38-2.2-4.11-2.23-1.74-.18-3.41 1.03-4.3 1.03-.89 0-2.26-1-3.72-.98-1.91.03-3.68 1.11-4.66 2.82-1.99 3.45-.51 8.55 1.43 11.35.95 1.37 2.07 2.91 3.55 2.85 1.43-.06 1.97-.92 3.7-.92 1.73 0 2.22.92 3.74.89 1.55-.03 2.52-1.39 3.46-2.77 1.09-1.59 1.54-3.13 1.56-3.21-.03-.01-2.99-1.15-3.02-4.57zM14.47 4.07c.79-.96 1.32-2.28 1.17-3.6-1.13.05-2.51.76-3.32 1.71-.73.84-1.37 2.19-1.2 3.48 1.27.1 2.56-.64 3.35-1.59z"></path></svg><span>Download for macOS</span></a><p class="text-xs text-gray-500 dark:text-gray-400 mt-2 mb-0">macOS 13+ · 0.7MB</p><a href="https://github.com/duggan/Wingman" class="inline-block mt-3 text-sm text-gray-500 dark:text-gray-400 hover:text-gray-900 dark:hover:text-gray-100" rel="noopener">View on GitHub →</a></div></div></div><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">It's a small application, and tightly scoped: it supports official Windows 10 and 11 ISOs, and uses frameworks introduced in macOS 13+ (Ventura).</span><p></p><p><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">This was an interesting one, because there's a C library, wimlib, that most applications in this genre use. It's used for managing the </span><i><em class="italic" style="white-space: pre-wrap;">Windows Imaging Format</em></i><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"> originally designed for Vista.</span><br><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">Turns out that there's only a small corner of this really needed for producing a bootable USB stick from an official ISO, trivially portable to Swift.</span></p><p><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">It's only ~3k lines of code, and I expect it will be easy enough to rebuild on future versions of macOS.</span></p><section class="changelog"><hr><p><strong>Changelog:</strong></p><ol><li><time datetime="2026-06-20T10:43:04.000Z">Jun 20, 2026, 10:43 AM</time> — Fixed typo.</li></ol></section> 2026-06-20T10:39:32.636Z

<p><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">Once again found myself needing to create a bootable Windows USB stick on macOS, once again surprised at how fiddly it was.</span></p><p><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">This time, though, I made an app.</span></p>