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descriptionUPDATING A WINREDUCED OS: WHAT THERE IS TO KNOW AND HOW TO AVOID WINDOWS UPDATES FROM MAKING YOUR LIFE HARD! EmptyUPDATING A WINREDUCED OS: WHAT THERE IS TO KNOW AND HOW TO AVOID WINDOWS UPDATES FROM MAKING YOUR LIFE HARD!

more_horiz
Hello to all guys,
although I started to use the tool only one month ago and I am very far from the experience of long time users, I played with it extensively and I think I can bring some contribute.
Getting used to the tool requires trials, patience and time, but once learned the removal process and how this affect the system, the results are amazing. I have been able to run Windows 10 Pro (without sacrifying anything of what I needed) in just 5Gb of install size and 500 Mb of RAM and there was still room for around 30% of additional opmitizations.

What drove me very crazy is when I had to deal with the updates and I'm afraid there isn't yet a definitive answer especially because the Windows 10 update process may change at any new update. If you expect to get your winreduced os auto-updated over time without any troubles like you're used to be from an untouched ISO, then I'm afraid this is never going to happen.
However, there are still good compromises.
Leaving the system without any update is something that you want to avoid not only for security (flaws in the system, exploits etc), but also because you can certainly stop your system from updating, you can't stop applications from getting updated and with a system with no update, soon or later you're going to have troubles especially if you're an advanced user (different is for people that uses the OS to navigate, emails and this kind of stuff).

This topic is not an official tutorial. As stated above I am not a long time user and my finding may contains mistakes and wrong assumptions (people with experiences are always invited to correct me when I am wrong). I am just sharing my experience for the benefit of all the users since I didn't found much info here in the forum and I had to learn everything myself.
I'll try to be most short and coincisive as possible, but there is a lot to say and you're better off to read everything carefully.

First of all, what causes Windows Update to fail are Cumulative Updates which, at least from what stated from Microsoft, should be released monthly. I found the same problematic for .Net framework CU too, not just the regular ones. I am not sure if these have less chances of failure or not and I don't know their release time-frame.
Second, save yourself from the wrong assumption and false sense of security when you see your CU successully installed. This is normal. Windows do some checks on the presence of components and if it cannot find them it will fail and undo the update process. If for whatever reason windows manage to fix the problem, it could restore some (or all) the components you removed.
You're supposed to remove only a limited number of components during the initial tests, therefore chances of success are pretty good. However as soon as you proceed with further removal, the update will fail.
Even if you decide to remove only a very small number of components (and in this case using WR does not have much sense) you're still not safe because components checked may chance on new CU releases.
It seems there is much more involved in the checking mechanism (registry checks, services etc) and Microsoft can change it at any time. Who wants more advanced details can check my bug reports and see what I found and traced before giving up.
So, please be very carefully, you really don't want to install your winreduced iso, apps, settings, data etc and then, one month later, find out that you need to restart everything from scratch because Windows refused to install your CU !!

OK! Let's start! 

Except updating from the settings app (which is the first one to fail) there are two other possible alternative methods to update your winreduced system.
I start by illustrating method 1 which is for sure the most desiderable.

THIS IS THE RECEIPT I USED (ALL VERSIONS ARE THE LATEST ONES AT THE TIME I WROTE THIS TOPIC):
WINDOWS 10 PROFESSIONAL: version 19H2 (november update)
LANGUAGE: En-US
TARGET CUMULATIVE UPDATE: KB4530684 (windows10.0-kb4528760-x64_4ea59b94564145460ab025616ff10460bb7894d8.msu)
WINREDUCER VERSION: 2.3.0.0
Link to wccf: https://pastebin.com/ep0Cqu3S (this is what I consider to be 30% of an extreme preset and it fails on standard windows update)

IMPORTANT DETAILS ON THE ABOVE WCCF:
1) I don't know if method 1 requires Windows Update protection mode or not. To stay on the safe side I enabled it. I also protected windows search and important files, but this is not a requirement. It's just my favorite protected features)
2) I don't know if method 1 works even with WinSXS folder cleanup. To stay on the safe side I didn't checked it.
3) Method 1 requires the preservation of the Setup.exe executable. The below options must be unselected based on this topic: [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]
- Automatic Removing Process: deselected
- Automatic Removing Process (Optimize ISO Size): deselected
- Automatic Removing Process (Expert Optimization): deselected
- ISO - Delete Unneeded Files: deselected
- ISO - Boot - Delete Unneeded Editions: deselected
- ISO - Windows - Unneeded Files Cleanup: deselected
Please note: the really needed option to keep deselected should be "ISO - Delete Unneeded Files", but I found I needed to uncheck somes of the above too. I didn't lost time to check what of these can be safely enabled since this was just an ISO built with minimal changes for debugging purpose.
4) Of all Optimizations I have only enabled "ISO - Windows - Delete Unneeded Editions" since I suppose should make any difference.

All tests performed in real machine and emulator (hyper-v) with the same results.

-------------------------------METHOD 1---------------------------
Based on my researches here in this forum and Ntlite blog this is how this method work:
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It applies to Ntlite, but I translated it to work with WR (someone may correct me if I have done some mistake).

Pros:
- It allows to apply the update without losing files, apps, settings, data etc.
- It is supposed to always work because components are removed from an ISO containing the integrated CU. I don't know if the configuration file must be the same in the whole process. In this test, it's the same (to stay on safe side).
- Could work (but I could be wrong) even with WinSXS folder cleanup
- Once completed, you will be left with the system exactly in the same state plus the CU installed. This means that it should be exempt from auto-restoration of removed components (not sure is there is something minor restored, may be the registry?)
Cons:
- Not covenient like regular windows update since involve bulding more than one an ISO, but not even much far (it may take hours, but this is a job done from the system in background. To the user should take no more than 5 minutes)

STEP 1
Load the windows ISO and the provided wccf. Apply changes, build the iso and proceed to installation.
Once the system boot into desktop disconnect from the network (in case that Windows decides to start auto-updating).

STEP 2
Open again the untouched win 10 iso in wireducer. Paste the cumulative update in "WORK\INTEGRATE\UPDATES\x64\19H2" and then pick up that folder from the update button.
I dind't integrated drivers and .Net framework CU, but I don't see why they should not work.
Press apply and build the ISO.

STEP 3
In winreducer open the iso built in STEP 2 and apply the same wccf used in step 1. This time you must deactivate the "Unattended" tab.
Appy changes and build the ISO.
IMPORTANT: YOU MAY ASK WHY I DON'T DO THIS STEP AND THE PREVIOUS STEP AT THE SAME TIME. Because I have read here in the forum comflicting reports. Some said doing all at once will not work because WR first remove components and then apply updates (which make no sense to me).
Others says that when WR recognize an update it first apply it and then proceed to the removal (make sense to me). If I remember well, the last time I tried WR applied the update after the removal of the components.
For that reason I preferred to stay on the safe side and split the taks.

STEP 4
From your winreduced system, mount the iso built on step 3 and double click on the mounted folder. If the autoinstaller does not start, enter inside the folder and manually execute Setup.exe.
As soon as the first screen of the installer appears, press on "Check how Windows setup download updates" and select "Not right now". Continue until the last screen.
At this point we should be presented with 3 options. The one that we want to select is "Keep personal files and Apps".
Proceed to installation and get our winreduced os updated!

That's all! Easy, right?

But...
Surprise!
UPDATING A WINREDUCED OS: WHAT THERE IS TO KNOW AND HOW TO AVOID WINDOWS UPDATES FROM MAKING YOUR LIFE HARD! 2020-010

The error states:
You can't keep Windows settings, personal files and apps because your current version of Windows might be installed in an unsupported directory.
If you get this message there are still some hopes, but you need to check some things. You can find all the technical details here:
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Unfortunately for me didn't worked!

Below is the log for which I didn't found any useful and no sign of error:
2020-01-30 02:09:00: BuildInfo: [10.0.18362.1 (19h1_release.190318-1202)]
2020-01-30 02:09:00: CommandLine: [F:\Sources\SetupPrep.exe ]
2020-01-30 02:09:00: Opening Box: [F:\Sources\SetupPrep.exe]
2020-01-30 02:09:00: Opening Box Result: [0x0]
2020-01-30 02:09:00: Deleting box result...
2020-01-30 02:09:00: ResumeMode: Not found.
2020-01-30 02:09:00: ResumeMode: [No]
2020-01-30 02:09:00: OsUninstallWarning: Execute file found [FALSE].
2020-01-30 02:09:00: OsUninstallWarning: [No]
2020-01-30 02:09:00: Checking cleanup registry value...
2020-01-30 02:09:00: Cleanup value missing... assuming no cleanup.
2020-01-30 02:09:00: Skipping cleanup.
2020-01-30 02:09:00: Preserve working path: [No]
2020-01-30 02:09:00: Cleaning working dir...
2020-01-30 02:09:00: Attempting to close previous ETW session...
2020-01-30 02:09:00: Attempting to clean mounted registry hives...
2020-01-30 02:09:00: Attempting to unmount SafeOs image...
2020-01-30 02:09:00: Attempting to preserve existing logs...
2020-01-30 02:09:00: Cleaning path: [C:\Windows\Panther\NewOs]...
2020-01-30 02:09:00: Creating path: [C:\Windows\Panther\NewOs\Panther]...
2020-01-30 02:09:00: Copying [C:\$WINDOWS.~BT\Sources\Panther] -> [C:\Windows\Panther\NewOs\Panther]...
2020-01-30 02:09:00: Cleaning working path: [C:\$WINDOWS.~BT]...
2020-01-30 02:09:00: Cleaning alternate storage paths...
2020-01-30 02:09:00: Cleaning MoSetup Volatile key...
2020-01-30 02:09:00: Removing CorrelationVector registry value...
2020-01-30 02:09:00: Cleaning orphaned SafeOs images...
2020-01-30 02:09:00: Removing cleanup registry value...
2020-01-30 02:09:00: Flushing MoSetup registry key...
2020-01-30 02:09:00: Creating path (with ACL): [C:\$WINDOWS.~BT]...
2020-01-30 02:09:00: Creating path: [C:\$WINDOWS.~BT\Sources]...
2020-01-30 02:09:04: Launching process: [C:\$WINDOWS.~BT\Sources\SetupHost.exe] with command-line [/Install /Media  /InstallFile "F:\Sources\Install.wim" /MediaPath "F:"] in Session: [-1]
2020-01-30 02:09:04: Launching: [C:\$WINDOWS.~BT\Sources\SetupHost.exe] [/Install /Media  /InstallFile "F:\Sources\Install.wim" /MediaPath "F:"] from []!
2020-01-30 02:09:04: Waiting for process events...

Now, what I'm doing wrong? Someone is using this method with success? It seems that the installer is checking for the presense of something, but what?
Everyone is invited to do the same tests possibly with different configuration files to increase chances to discover what the installer is checking for!

-------------------------------METHOD 2---------------------------
Basicaly you do step 2 and step 3 (you must reactivate the unattended TAB), then you burn the resulting ISO in an USB drive and do an install boot.

Pro:
- It has always worked for me, no matter how many components you remove.
- With this method is recommended all the optimization turned on, WinSXS folder cleanup and removal of windows update components, related services etc. The good news is that the system should gain a great performance boost with less consume of resources (someone who currently use this may want to confirm or not this assumption).
 I once tried to manually remove files in the WinSXS folder and I was not able to delete most of them because they were used from processes and many other reasons. So, this is not just static data only called from windows for the updating process. It seems to silently consume resource, so I have reason to suspect that WinSXS folder cleanup may improve performance other than the huge gain in free space. 
Cons:
- It doen't allow to preserve apps, settings, files etc. Everytime there is a cumulative update you need to rebuild the iso from scratch and integrate the new update.
You will have to backup all important data and once installed, proceed to restore settings, applications, files, etc. In other words it's like installing the system for the first time on a fresh system and you need to do this monthly and may be, even twice a month in case that the CU for .Net framework is not released together with the regular one.
For a standard user which only uses the system to navigate, email, and not sofisticated apps that most of the time can be made portable is easy.
For advanced users like me who use Visual Studio with 40 extensions which must reinstalled from scrach, SDKs, other big programs strictly tied to the system along with hundred of heavy customizations it's a big problem because takes lot of time.
- Windows Feature will not work. However if you enable the feature directly in WR, it works fine and this should also apply to .Net framework 3.5 too
- It is stated that breaks the app view, but sincerely I didn't had this problem. May be I have not investigated enough.

>>> POSSIBLE WORKAROUNDS TO AUTOMATE AND SPEED UP THE RESTORAL PROCESS OF METHOD 2 (apps, settings, files etc)
- Create a second partition where you store your data, music, portable apps etc. In Wireducer set the default location of Downloads, Documents etc to the ones you stored in that partition. In this way once you reinstall they are already at your hands and you don't need to do anything
- Try to convert your applications into portable apps and store them in that partition.
- Install chocolatey package manager or, even better, OneGet which works through powershell and include several repository included chocolatey. It allow to install in batch applications and the list of apps is very large (there is also Visual Studio ad many other nices apps). Depending from the app you need to restore it may be possible to pass your setting through the command line. For other apps you can try to replace the generated folder containing files and settings with your own backup foler and is easy to automate this.
For apps that requires installation and are not available on OneGet, you should be able to install them in batch and silenty. For windows store apps, in theory, once you connect it should automatically redowload and install them along with your settings directly from the cloud.
For me the situation is more complicated and need researches to restore other things, but for many people should be enough.
- You could skip the first cumulative update and install the second one. In this way, for two months you have no troubles.
- Keep Windows Update service enables because it allows to run a nice app called WuMgr. It can download and install removal tool and very small updates automatically. Also useful to get informed where there are new CU available for your system. It allow to download the CU directly into the Winreducer update foler.
People like me that removed windows defender and protection may have the problem that this app, in auto-update mode, will install removal tool which we don't need. The same applies for other people which need to block the autoinstall of CU. I dind't saw an option to blacklist specific updates from being installed, but the software is open source and I can modify the source to add this feature and share the application with all of you (this is one of the main advantages of open source projects!).
- Waiting for other ideas...

-------------------------------CONCLUSION---------------------------
I know guys that you all want to take advantage of METHOD 1 and this is where I put most of my efforts. Researches didn't helped, reporting bugs didn't either.
I don't even know if it is possible at all to get method 1 working, but given that it works in NtLite, I don't see why it shouldn't in WR too.

Thanks to all and I hope that this topic will people to better understand.
Thanks

descriptionUPDATING A WINREDUCED OS: WHAT THERE IS TO KNOW AND HOW TO AVOID WINDOWS UPDATES FROM MAKING YOUR LIFE HARD! EmptyRe: UPDATING A WINREDUCED OS: WHAT THERE IS TO KNOW AND HOW TO AVOID WINDOWS UPDATES FROM MAKING YOUR LIFE HARD!

more_horiz
Just a quick update. Investigations continued and although I have made new discoveries, the problem with Method 1 remains the same. I will not write here all the details to avoid making the instructions above more complicated than they already are, especially for non advanced users and they will not certainly help given that no one here seems to have the minimum idea.

I am going to stick with method 2 which (at least for low hardware) seems also to be better for performance. I have not performed deeps tests over the time to confirm this, but from a direct comparison side by side, by cleaning WinSXS folder (and all the other optimizations available when we remove WU functionality) seems to consume less resources. How much this will make difference in real usage I don't know, but with limited hardware I suppose it will. In addition to that, this is not funny anymore and it's time for me to give up and stick with a stable solution.

If you have read carefully you'll see that there are still several doubts and concerns, but I am not going to address any of them because I don't want to make the mistake to make this topic more complicated as I have already done with another topic.

So, to conclude, I will not add further details to this topic and I will not update it anymore, but I leave it opened because I believe it can help users to understand some unclear and unknown obscure sides of the update process at least based on my learnings. This topic can contains mistakes and wrong assumptions from my side, therefore take it only as a base to learn things for which there aren't much info available.
Although Winterstorm don't certainly needs to read this topic and my findings, I am still available if he needs my help in case that he want to develop a solution to this.

Thanks to all

descriptionUPDATING A WINREDUCED OS: WHAT THERE IS TO KNOW AND HOW TO AVOID WINDOWS UPDATES FROM MAKING YOUR LIFE HARD! EmptyRe: UPDATING A WINREDUCED OS: WHAT THERE IS TO KNOW AND HOW TO AVOID WINDOWS UPDATES FROM MAKING YOUR LIFE HARD!

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