The SBOM tool CLI is distributed through GitHub Releases. The tool is packaged as a single platform-dependent executable file. Executable platform-specific and release-specific versions of the tool are available for download at latest. Users can also download the executable file for each of the binaries for verification.
| Platform | Binary filename | SBOM filename |
|---|---|---|
| Windows | sbom-tool-win-x64.exe | win-x64-manifest.spdx.json |
| Linux | sbom-tool-linux-x64 | linux-x64-manifest.spdx.json |
| MacOS | sbom-tool-osx-x64 | osx-x64-manifest.spdx.json |
A user has a dotnet project for which they are building a SBOM. In this example case, the source for the project lives in c:\Users\test\TestProject.
The user may first build the above project by running the following command, which should build the project and place all binaries in the c:\outputDrop folder.
dotnet build --output c:\outputDrop
Now the user can generate a SBOM for the above project by running the tool they just downloaded:
./sbom-tool-win-x64.exe generate -b c:\outputDrop -bc c:\Users\test\TestProject -pn TestProject -pv 1.0.0 -ps MyCompany -nsb http://mycompany.com
In this scenario, the user configured the sbom tool to generate an SBOM for all the files in the c:\outputDrop folder. The sbom tool will search the c:\Users\test\TestProject path for *.csproj or packages.config files in order to build the list of dependency packages for inclusion in the SBOM file. The -pn and -pv parameters configure the package name and version. A globally-unique -nsb parameter specifies the namespace base URI for use in documentation of the namespace in the final SPDX 2.2-formated SBOM file. If the command fails to provide the -nsb parameter, then the tool will provide a default globally-unique namespace base URI that complies with the SPDX 2.2 specifications.
By default, the tool will place the generated SBOM inside the _manifest\spdx_2.2\ subfolder under the path which the -b argument specifies. In this example, the SBOM will be located here: c:\outputDrop\_manifest\spdx_2.2\manifest.spdx.json
Successful runs of the tool require full write permissions for the path specified in the -b argument. Users encountering errors when the tool is attempting to write the _manifest\spdx_2.2\ subfolder should consider these steps:
- If someone else controls the user's network or hardware settings (such as employer-owned infrastructure), contact the respective network administrator(s) for assistance.
- If the user controls their own infrastructure, review and (as needed) update folder security and attribute settings. Consult the hardware manufacturer or user support communities as needed for further assistance.
- Update the path specified in the -b argument to an externally connected hard drive or another alternate folder located off-device.
Common errors in these situations may include variations of these messages:
##[error]Encountered an error while generating the manifest.
##[error]Error details: Could not find file c:\outputDrop\_manifest\spdx_2.2\manifest.spdx.json.
The above list contains the minimum mandatory parameters that the user needs to provide in order for the tool to generate the SBOM file. A full list of arguments is listed in here.
By default, the tool will generate SBOM file in a newly created subfolder called _manifest inside the BuildDropPath (-b). In case the user wants to place the SBOM in a different path, specify the ManifestDirPath -m parameter, e.g.:
./sbom-tool-win-x64.exe generate -b c:\outputDrop -bc c:\Users\test\TestProject -pn TestProject -pv 1.0.0 -ps MyCompany -nsb http://mycompany.com -m c:\sboms
This command will cause the SBOM tool to generate the SBOM inside the c:\sboms folder. The tool will create a new _manifest\spdx_2.2 subfolder for use in storing the SBOM being generated. In this scenario, the tool will store the SBOM generated during this run in the path c:\sboms\_manifest\spdx_2.2\manifest.spdx.json.
Please note that the tool will generate the
_manifestsubfolder inside the ManifestDirPath folder. The command will not need to provide a folder path that ends in_manifestfor this parameter.
The user can specify verbose logging just by specifying the -V parameter, e.g:
./sbom-tool-win-x64.exe generate -b c:\outputDrop -bc c:\Users\test\TestProject -pn TestProject -pv 1.0.0 -ps MyCompany -nsb http://mycompany.com -V Verbose
Users can scan docker images in order to determine dependency packages. In this scenario, the user wants to gather dependencies from the docker image testImage:0.0.1. The user can run the following command:
./sbom-tool-win-x64.exe generate -b c:\outputDrop -bc c:\Users\test\TestProject -pn TestProject -pv 1.0.0 -ps MyCompany -nsb http://mycompany.com -di testImage:0.0.1
In addition to the test image, the user may also want to gather all dependencies in a build machine named ubuntu:1.9. The command can specify multiple image arguments for this parameter by separating them with a comma:
./sbom-tool-win-x64.exe generate -b c:\outputDrop -bc c:\Users\test\TestProject -pn TestProject -pv 1.0.0 -ps MyCompany -nsb http://mycompany.com -di testImage:0.0.1,ubuntu:1.9
The arguments for -b and -bc will specify the path that the tool will scan. For example, the user can generate an SBOM for only the dependency packages of the Docker image with the command:
./sbom-tool-win-x64.exe generate -m c:\outputPath -pn TestProject -pv 1.0.0 -ps MyCompany -nsb http://mycompany.com -di testImage:0.0.1
-m provides the user-defined path for generating the SBOM. The tool will generate a new _manifest\spdx_2.2 subfolder which will hold the SBOM file created during this run. The files section for these parameters will be empty as this run will only scan for the dependency packages of the image.
In order to scan a path to populate the files section of the SBOM, the user can run the following command:
./sbom-tool-win-x64.exe generate -b c:\outputDrop -m c:\outputPath -pn TestProject -pv 1.0.0 -ps MyCompany -nsb http://mycompany.com -di testImage:0.0.1
You can exclude directories from the component scan by specifying the -cd parameter you can pass arguments directly to Component Detection. One of these arguments is --DirectoryExclusionList Filters out specific directories following a minimatch pattern from the component scan which will leave
the contents of these directories out of the packages section of the SBOM. For example, if you wanted to exclude the bin directory from the component scan you would run the following command
./sbom-tool-win-x64.exe generate -b c:\outputDrop -bc c:\Users\test\TestProject -pn TestProject -pv 1.0.0 -ps MyCompany -nsb http://mycompany.com -cd "--DirectoryExclusionList **/bin/**"
By default, users commonly log telemetry to the console output. In order to log the telemetry as part of the SBOM file, specify the -t parameter:
./sbom-tool-win-x64.exe generate -b c:\outputDrop -bc c:\Users\test\TestProject -pn TestProject -pv 1.0.0 -ps MyCompany -nsb http://mycompany.com -t c:\telemetry
With a SBOM file in hand, use the tool to validate the output file with the command:
./sbom-tool-win-x64.exe validate -b c:\outputDrop -o c:\validationOutputPath\output.json -mi SPDX:2.2
This sample command provides the minimum mandatory arguments required to validate an SBOM:
-b should be the path same path used to generate the SBOM file.
In this scenario, the tool will default to searching for an SBOM at the c:\outputDrop\_manifest\spdx_2.2\manifest.spdx.json path.
-o is the output path where the tool will write the validation results. This path can be any file path on the system. In this case the tool will look for the validationOutputPath directory, create a file named output.json, and write the validation output.
-mi is the ManifestInfo, which provides the user's desired name and version of the manifest format.
Currently only SPDX2.2 is supported.
If the original command created the SBOM files with the following parameters:
./sbom-tool-win-x64.exe generate -b c:\outputDrop -bc c:\Users\test\TestProject -pn TestProject -pv 1.0.0 -ps MyCompany -nsb http://mycompany.com -m c:\sboms
Then the SBOM will not be located at the default location. In order to allow the tool to validate the SBOM at the different location, the user must provide the path to the _manifest subfolder that was created in that directory:
./sbom-tool-win-x64.exe validate -b c:\outputDrop -o c:\validationOutputPath\output.json -mi SPDX:2.2 -m c:\sboms\_manifest
Verbose logging and writing telemetry to a file will function in the same way they do when generating an SBOM. Here is an example of using both parameters when validating and SBOM:
./sbom-tool-win-x64.exe validate -b c:\outputDrop -o c:\validationOutputPath\output.json -mi SPDX:2.2 -t c:\telemetry -V verbose