Installing

To start using the Black Duck Portal:

1. Go to GUI properties > Download portal in Defensics.
2. Select Connect to Black Duck Portal.
3. Login session opens, click on Open in browser.
4. Device Confirmation window opens, click on Confirm.

To start using the Download Arena, go to the following address: https://www.codenomicon.com/.

A page is opened containing a link to the Download Arena. Once you click on Arena Login link, you are prompted for your username and password. After you have logged in, you will see a page with Defensics downloadables.

To get started with using Defensics, you have to first download and install Defensics. Defensics is a test control framework that can be used to install, operate, and view the results of Defensics test suites. Multiple test suites can be configured and operated concurrently through the Defensics. It can also be used to configure and control test suite execution in command-line mode.

Defensics installer is supplied in two formats: as a shell script (SH file) for installation on Linux platforms, and as an MSI installer executable (self-extracting EXE file) for Windows platforms.

To download the installer for your platform, right-click on the Defensics installer file (in Download Arena) or select the Download button next to it (in Black Duck Community). The file name has the format black-duck-defensics-installer-X.Y.Z. For Linux systems, the file extension will be .sh, and for Windows the extension is .exe. Select Save Link As (Firefox) or Save Target As (Internet Explorer). The installer file will be downloaded and saved to your PC.

New versions of Defensics, as well as any Defensics test suite, can be downloaded and updated simply from the Suite Browser in Defensics. In the Suite Browser, the downloaded installer starts automatically. In CLI, it has to be executed manually.

After the download has finished, the installer can be started in two ways:

• By double-clicking on the installer SH or EXE file.
• By starting the Windows installer in a command prompt as follows:

 C:\path\to\black-duck-defensics-installer-X.Y.Z.exe

• By starting the Linux SH installer in a terminal as follows:

 /path/to/black-duck-defensics-installer-X.Y.Z.sh

Replace X.Y.Z above with the current Defensics release (e.g., 2026.6.0).

The Windows installer is signed with a trusted code-signing certificate and the operating system automatically confirms the signature, and shows the Verified publisher in the UAC dialog when starting the installer.

For the Linux installer, you can download the additional black-duck-defensics-installer-X.Y.Z.sh.sig and installer-public-key.pem files from the download portal and verify the signature locally as follows:

# Decode base64 signature
openssl enc -d -A -base64 -in black-duck-defensics-installer-X.Y.Z.sh.sig -out installer-signature.bin
# Verify the installer using signature and matching public key
openssl dgst -sha256 -verify installer-public-key.pem -signature installer-signature.bin black-duck-defensics-installer-X.Y.Z.sh

Next steps differ between the Windows EXE and Linux SH installers. The following sections will guide you through the installation steps for both Windows and Linux.

The Windows installer is a Java installer distributed as an EXE file built for installing Defensics and required dependencies.

In addition to Defensics, the Windows installer can automatically install Npcap library and drivers if you are using Defensics with a license key. The EXE installer also registers Defensics as an installed program and allows uninstallation via Windows Programs and Features or simply by executing the Uninstaller from the installation directory.

Note that Administrator privileges are required due to installing Npcap packet capture library and key drivers with the Defensics Windows installer.

Defensics installer will proceed to the installation of the main Defensics components. The startup screen for the Defensics installation is shown in the figure below:

Clicking Next will display important information about using Black Duck Defensics before moving to a selection dialog for what type of installation you want to perform: Full, Standard, and Custom. This dialog is shown in the figure below:

Selecting Full will install Defensics main application, Npcap packet capture library and FLEXnet license server binaries.

Selecting Standard will install Defensics main application and Npcap packet capture library.

Selecting Custom will allow you to select additional components such as FLEXnet license server binaries. FLEXnet license server binaries are only required for running a local FLEXnet server. Next the installer will ask for the installation path for the Defensics main application, as shown in the figure below:

It is recommended to install Defensics into the default location, unless you have a specific need to install Defensics into a different folder or drive. If you opted for Custom installation, on the next screen you can choose if you want to install just the Defensics main application and Npcap packet capture library and FLEXnet license server.

After you have selected the features that will be installed, you'll be asked to confirm where the installer should place the shortcuts for starting Defensics. Once you have confirmed your preferred shortcuts, the installation will begin.

After the main application has been installed, the installer will proceed to install any additional components that you selected. The key drivers and Npcap will be installed in the background.

Note that Defensics installer will also automatically adjust FLEXLM_TIMEOUT environmental variable from its default value 100000 microseconds (100ms) to 1000000 microseconds (1 second) unless the variable has been modified before. This is done to mitigate licensing issues cause by slow networks.

After all of the components have been installed, Defensics installer will display a screen indicating that installation has been successfully completed, as shown in the figure below:

After completing the installation, you are ready to start using Defensics.

To start Defensics, click on the desktop icon.

If you want to uninstall Defensics later, the easiest way is to uninstall the software from the Windows Settings (Apps in Windows 11). You can also invoke the Defensics Uninstaller from the installation directory, or using the Start menu shortcut.

To uninstall Defensics, click the Next and the uninstallation will begin.

This completes the uninstallation.

Note that the uninstaller will also remove installed key drivers.

The EXE installer also supports console based installation. You can start it with the CLI switch -c. Note that since the installer is also a GUI installer, it is started in the background by default, which means that you have to use the start command to put it in the foreground and be able to enter information:

 start /wait defensics-installer-2025.12.0-x86_64.exe -c

More options are shown with the -h switch:

 defensics-installer-2025.12.0-x86_64.exe -h

Test suite updates are available from the download portal. To access the download portal, you have to enter valid credentials from the Defensics menu.

Go to Menu > Download Portal and enter your credentials.

In order to activate a license:

1. Go to Menu and click on License Manager.
2. Under FlexServer Configuration, enter the Host address and Port details for your setup and Save Changes.
3. License Status is updated.

If you want to remove a license, click on Clear license configuration.