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Distributing Mac software is increasing my cortisol levels

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Re: Distributing Mac software is increasing my cortisol levels

#191

Post by steve1977 »

TrajansRow wrote: post #22

So, Linux gets a free pass for requiring chmod +x to run his tool, but needing to run xattr on MacOS is somehow worthy of an entire blog post to complain about it? Serious question - Is it really true that Windows 11 will run an untrusted .exe without a warning?

I think that's the most important part in the whole article.

This is a Claude Code tool for developers. I'd assume that any potential user for this tool should be perfectly able to run that xattr command (and if they are not, they probably shouldn't be playing around with Claude Code either... yup, some additional "gatekeeping" from my side here).

You could probably even make some curl -sL https://github.com/myrepo/installme.sh | bash script for these users which takes care of the xattr command.

Your typical macOS enduser does not use command line tools. Or they use something like Homebrew.

Btw the proper way to distribute binary would probably be pkg installer.

Re: Distributing Mac software is increasing my cortisol levels

#192

Post by steve1977 »

Random09 wrote: post #95
TrajansRow wrote: post #22

So, Linux gets a free pass for requiring chmod +x to run his tool, but needing to run xattr on MacOS is somehow worthy of an entire blog post to complain about it? Serious question - Is it really true that Windows 11 will run an untrusted .exe without a warning?

The main difference is that on Linux you can do it on gui. It's much easier to explain and convice the user to click "allow executing file as program" checkbox than a xatttr obscure cli command.

Which is fine. If you don't know what that obscure xattri cli command is doing, you shouldn't be running it.

macOS makes it easy to run software which meets some requirements by Apple.

macOS makes it possible to run other software if you (the user) know what you're doing.

Re: Distributing Mac software is increasing my cortisol levels

#193

Post by ActorNightly »

kqp wrote: post #92
Wowfunhappy wrote: post #5

Any user who does not like Gatekeeper can turn it off on their machine in ten seconds by running this in a Terminal: sudo spctl —-master-disable People will say, no, that’s too big a hammer, it’s not safe… but then, like, what do you actually want? Either you keep Gatekeeper because you like the friction it introduces, or you don’t like that friction and you should go turn it off. Pick one, you obviously can’t have b…

> what do you actually want? Give me the ability to choose what I trust. “You can either trust Apple and nobody else, even yourself, or you can trust literally everybody” is obviously not a good faith implementation of this. Apple excels at steering the narrative with false conflation and false dichotomy, I’d also remind you of the came-and-went secure boot debate, which Apple successfully steered into Apple owns the…

I want the ability to run any linux distro on my macbook, like I can with any other computer that is not a macbook.

Re: Distributing Mac software is increasing my cortisol levels

#195

Post by hermitcrab »

cosmic_cheese wrote: post #116
musicale wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Apple's contempt for backward compatibility This is absolutely correct. Instead of maintaining any sort of ABI and API stability, Apple offloads a constant burden of maintenance updates across thousands of developers, just to keep existing apps from breaking every year with a new iOS version. This takes time which could be spent in more productive ways such as fixing bugs, adding features, or developing new apps. I…

Maybe it’s worse for games, but I’ve been maintaining non-game apps on both iOS and Android for many years and keeping the iOS halves functional has generally been pretty chill. Updates aren’t required all that often and it’s rare that APIs break entirely on me, especially if targeting older SDKs. Usually the worst post-WWDC fallout is needing to recompile the app in question with minimal changes. By comparison, Andr…

>Usually the worst post-WWDC fallout is needing to recompile the app in question with minimal changes.

But that still means that any app that is not actively maintains dies very quickly. I've got software I wrote for Windows 7 that still runs fine on Windows 11.

Re: Distributing Mac software is increasing my cortisol levels

#196

Post by hermitcrab »

fassssst wrote: post #107
hermitcrab wrote: post #37

I have been developing software for Macs and PCs as an Indie for 20 years now. I sympathize with the author of the post. You get the feeling that Apple thinks you should be grateful that they allow you to develop apps for their platform. The author didn't mention Apple's contempt for backward compatibility. Apple like to regularly nuke their entire developer system from orbit. Try running an app developed 10 years ag…

fwiw you can ship through Microsoft Store for free and not have to pay for signing.

Last time I looked the MS Store was just a sad catalogue of shovelware. Has it improved?

Re: Distributing Mac software is increasing my cortisol levels

#197

Post by tuna74 »

ActorNightly wrote: post #193
kqp wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> what do you actually want? Give me the ability to choose what I trust. “You can either trust Apple and nobody else, even yourself, or you can trust literally everybody” is obviously not a good faith implementation of this. Apple excels at steering the narrative with false conflation and false dichotomy, I’d also remind you of the came-and-went secure boot debate, which Apple successfully steered into Apple owns the…

I want the ability to run any linux distro on my macbook, like I can with any other computer that is not a macbook.

Macs have enough open firmware to allow you to run any OS that you want. Linux Asahi only supports a certain subset of modern Mac HW, if you want to speed up development you should probably contribute to that project.

Re: Distributing Mac software is increasing my cortisol levels

#198

Post by matwood »

Zetaphor wrote: post #59

How does anyone who cares about open source or even development more generally see this and go "Yeah that's the OS I want to use"? I genuinely don't understand why so many developers are willing to compromise so much for a thin laptop.

> I genuinely don't understand why so many developers are willing to compromise so much for a thin laptop.

Because many developers never run into these issues? A Mac has been my primary development machine since the G4 PB days. I’ve tried to switch to Linux a few times, and it’s always been a worse experience. Then I see these types of stories on HN, and I’m reminded we all use our computers very differently from each other.

Re: Distributing Mac software is increasing my cortisol levels

#199

Post by jiehong »

This made me think of a potential workaround that would have a better UI: create a directory (maybe named 'Trust Zone'), and have it watched by something like automator. As soon as you move a file in there, it reacts and remove the quarantine bit on that file.

The enrollment app on Mac OS feels like a second citizen. I think Apple is slowly giving up on ensuring the experience on its own Mac apps is working as well as on iOS. I hope to be corrected now that the Macbook Neo is more popular, but I won't be holding my breath.

Re: Distributing Mac software is increasing my cortisol levels

#200

Post by red_admiral »

novok wrote: post #83
neoeno wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Under 16s can’t buy energy drinks in the UK Edit: currently a voluntary but widespread scheme by retailers, proposed to be law. TIL

can they also not buy tea, coffee or coca cola then? oh no, they might drink the caffeination amount of... 2 cans of pepsi!

The UK also has a big issue with "corner shops" (tiny stores operated usually by one person) that are fronts for organised crime and will sell you a lot more than energy drinks without checking your ID. Cash payment usually preferred.

Also things are going to get hot at the next general election if you're following what just happened in this week's council elections.

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