OpenWU — Universal Windows Update Manager (GUI + CLI)

Open, auditable Windows Update control — GUI like WUMT, engine you can trust.

OpenWU is a general-purpose, open-source Windows Update management tool built on .NET 8 and native Windows Update Agent (WUA) COM APIs. It provides a classic desktop GUI (WinForms) for interactive update management alongside a separate, lightweight CLI executable (openwu-cli.exe) with --json support for enterprise automation.

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Interface

Updates	History

Settings / Policy	About

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🚀 Getting Started (GUI First)

Double-click OpenWU.exe (or launch from elevated terminal):

OpenWU.exe

The graphical user interface opens with full administrator rights (via UAC manifest):

1. Click Refresh (F5) to scan for pending Windows Updates.
2. Use Select Security or Select All to check updates.
3. Double-click any row (or inspect the detail pane) to view full KB details, release descriptions, and support URLs.
4. Click Install or Hide to manage updates safely.
5. Click About to inspect version details, license information, disclaimers, and log file paths.

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💻 CLI Automation Mode (openwu-cli.exe)

For headless automation, remote management, and RMM scripts, use openwu-cli.exe:

# Test WUA session health & elevation status
openwu-cli.exe test --json

# List pending updates as JSON
openwu-cli.exe list --json

# Perform a WhatIf simulation for security updates
openwu-cli.exe install --security-only --whatif --json

# Silently install security updates and reboot if required
openwu-cli.exe install --security-only --reboot --json

# Hide specific KB articles and persist to policy
openwu-cli.exe hide --kb KB5031234 --persist

# View update history
openwu-cli.exe history --last 20 --json

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🛡️ Safety, Policy & Logging

• Central Policy Store: Standardized configuration saved at %ProgramData%\OpenWU\policy.json.
• Action Log: Real hide, unhide, and install actions are recorded to audit logs at %ProgramData%\OpenWU\logs\actions-YYYYMMDD.log.
• Domain Controller Protection: Blocks installation on Active Directory DCs unless explicitly allowed via policy or --allow-domain-controller.
• Title Denial Filters: Soft-denies updates containing keywords like "Preview" to prevent unstable builds from installing automatically.
• Safe Defaults: Drivers and optional updates are excluded by default.

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📦 Download & Verification

Official release binaries are published on GitHub Releases:

• Repository: https://github.com/FAWK-TECH/openwu
• Release Checksums: Verify downloaded binaries against SHA256SUMS.txt:

Get-FileHash OpenWU.exe,openwu-cli.exe -Algorithm SHA256

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🏗️ Architecture & Building from Source

OpenWu.Core          WUA COM engine, policy store, guards, ActionLog
OpenWu.CliLib        CliHost & JSON automation envelope (no WinForms link)
OpenWu.App           WinForms GUI (OpenWU.exe - no console window)
OpenWu.Cli           CLI host executable (openwu-cli.exe)
OpenWu.Core.Tests    xUnit test suite

Prerequisites

• .NET 8.0 SDK

Build & Test

dotnet build OpenWu.sln
dotnet test OpenWu.sln

Publish Executables

.\scripts\publish.ps1

Output binaries:

• artifacts/win-x64/OpenWU.exe (WinForms GUI)
• artifacts/win-x64/openwu-cli.exe (CLI Console)

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📄 Documentation

• Comparison & Prior Art
• Policy Specification
• CLI & Remoting Guide
• GUI Specification
• Code Signing Guide
• ROADMAP 0.2

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📜 License

MIT License — Copyright (c) 2026 OpenWU Contributors