BuildIso

BuildIso is a lightweight and portable ISO generator designed specifically for OS developers who need a simple, fast, and reliable way to create bootable ISO images. It requires no dependencies, no installation, and integrates seamlessly into any workflow, including Visual Studio, custom build scripts, or standalone usage. The program takes a project folder containing an iso_root directory and a bootloader at boot/boot.bin, and produces a clean, bootable ISO ready for testing on virtual machines or physical hardware.

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• Fully portable with zero installation. BuildIso is a single executable file with no external dependencies, runtime requirements, or system registry entries. It can be copied to any folder, run from a USB drive, or committed directly to a project repository without modifying the host environment.
• Hybrid BIOS/UEFI ISO creation. The tool supports building images that boot on legacy BIOS systems via boot/boot.bin, and optionally includes a UEFI boot image at boot/efiboot.img. The UEFI image must contain EFI/BOOT/BOOTX64.EFI; BuildIso packages both boot methods into a single ISO without altering their content.
• Strict input validation. Before generating any ISO, BuildIso verifies the existence of the iso_root directory and the mandatory boot/boot.bin file. If UEFI support is requested, it also checks for boot/efiboot.img. Missing any required component aborts the operation with a clear error message.
• Interactive and command-line modes. Run without arguments to launch an interactive wizard that prompts for the project path, UEFI inclusion, and Secure Boot consideration. Provide the project path as a single argument to execute silently, ideal for integration into makefiles or post-build events.
• Secure Boot awareness (informational only). When the Secure Boot option is enabled, BuildIso displays a reminder that the UEFI image must be signed with a valid private key. The program performs no signing or modification of efiboot.img, leaving all Secure Boot responsibilities to the developer.
• Visual Studio External Tools integration. BuildIso can be added as an external tool in Visual Studio, enabling one-click ISO generation directly from the IDE. Using Visual Studio macros like $(ProjectDir) as an argument automates image creation after every successful build.
• Configurable boot sector size for BIOS. The program accepts BIOS bootloader images of either 512 bytes (classic boot sector) or 2048 bytes (no-emulation mode), supporting both simple bootloaders and more advanced ones like Limine or GRUB in legacy BIOS mode.
• Full iso_root content inclusion. All files and directories placed inside the iso_root folder (kernel, modules, configuration files, user applications) are copied exactly as-is to the root directory of the final ISO, preserving subdirectory structures and long filenames.
• Sub-second ISO generation speed. The internal implementation writes ISO 9660 file systems directly without unnecessary compression or processing, allowing images of several hundred megabytes to be generated in under 500 milliseconds on modern hardware.
• Explicit error messages and return codes. On any failure (missing directory, absent mandatory file, write errors), BuildIso prints the exact reason to the console and terminates with a non-zero return code, facilitating error detection in automated build scripts.
• No external dependencies or administrator privileges. Compiled statically, BuildIso requires no installed tools such as mkisofs, xorriso, Cygwin, or WSL. It functions even in restricted environments where users lack software installation rights.

Development of BuildIso began in 2022 by a team of engineers focused on low-level systems programming. The application is written entirely in C++17 using only the standard library and high-level operating system calls, ensuring portability between Windows and Linux without additional compatibility layers.

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