Sandboxing on OS X looms as does uncertainty for many Mac apps
Arnold Kim has written a great article for MacRumors about the upcoming sandboxing restrictions on OS X. I admit to not really thinking about this a great deal, but it’s clear Apple’s new approach could be a very big problem for any Mac user who uses anything beyond pretty basic apps:
Examples of Mac Apps that will be affected include iTunes controllers (Tagalicious, CoverSutra), inter-app communication (Fantastical), apps that browse the file system (Transmit), system-wide keyboard shortcut utilities (TextExpander), file syncing, and backups utilities.
From what I’d heard in the past, apps that require ‘deep’ system access and hacks were most at threat, but it’s clear that such access and hacks are actually pretty commonplace. For example, if apps that browse the file system (beyond, I suspect, Open/Save dialogs) are at threat from being booted out of the Mac App Store, that’s practically every app related to web design.
Jason Snell commented for Macworld about the plans:
Not only does this approach risk turning the Mac App Store into a wasteland of arcade games and one-trick-pony apps, it risks dumbing down the Mac app ecosystem as a whole.
What’s clear is that Snell might have been being optimistic here, since many of the very best one-trick-pony apps are those that provide extra functionality to existing apps. A case in point: I Love Stars, which shows a rating for the currently playing iTunes track in the menu bar and enables you to amend it by clicking dots/stars. It’s pretty depressing to think that even apps like this might soon disappear.
Snell:
While developers can always opt out of the Mac App Store, they’re reluctant to do so.
There are good reasons for this. First, most Mac users never buy new software, but Apple is using the Mac App Store to change this, training users to buy apps in much the same way it did on iOS. But I suspect it’ll be increasingly rare for people to stray beyond the store, and so if your app isn’t included, you risk losing a lot of sales. Secondly, I still suspect the Mac App Store is only temporarily an optional means of installing Mac software. At some point, it’s going to become the only way, perhaps with OS X Whatever 10.8 Is Called, in 2013. If this all comes to pass, we really will have seen a lot of iOS come back to the Mac—perhaps a bit too much.
Note: I’d welcome any comments from developers on this article, not least if I’m misinterpreting how things might come to pass next year on OS X.
Not a developer, but I got the email this morning. I think this bit from the guidelines is particularly important:
> If you choose to not sandbox your app now, or if you determine that you need a temporary exception entitlement, use Apple’s bug reporting system to let Apple know what’s not working for you. Apple considers feature requests as it develops the Mac OS X platform.
A long shot, certainly, but is it worth filing a bug report “Lots of apps don’t fit with sandboxing”? Occasionally Apple listens: witness the cleaning issue that is apparently fixed in iOS 5.0.1ß.
I suppose this isn’t an option for many apps, but could devs have two separate apps? I know Alfred already does this — they can’t have the upgradeable Power Pack in the App Store version, so they have two separate versions. Not a brilliant solution, but I suppose it’s better than nothing.
Ugh.