6 ms·

Apple is blocking Apple Silicon Mac users from sideloading iPhone apps

72 points by neogodless 6y ago

musicale 6y ago
Who knew that Apple would decide to use its DRM? /s > Apple moving to block the unauthorized app installs isn’t necessarily surprising > Apple has given [iOS] developers power to block their apps from running on the Mac — a power that is undermined by sideloading Presumably it's a response to a) piracy/unlicensed use of iOS apps, b) developers who don't want to support macOS, and c) developers who want to charge higher prices to macOS users.
- rgovostes 6y ago
  (d) Apple is trying to spare developers who haven't yet addressed the bugs that arise when running their apps, written for a different platform with a completely different user interface idiom, from being inundated with support requests and unhappy reviews. I think the answer is a little from each column, but (c) has the strongest weight: some apps, say Cultured Code's Things and The Omni Group's OmniGraffle, are sold as separate Mac and iOS SKUs. Apple would damage their businesses if they allowed the iPad app run on the Mac without the developer approving it. I hope it becomes the norm soon, but we're in an early stage of the transition. It wouldn't surprise me if someone figures out that they simply need to re-sign the binaries to run them, though.
  - thefounder 6y ago
    >> Apple would damage their businesses if they allowed the iPad app run on the Mac without the developer approving it. I hope it becomes the norm soon, but we're in an early stage of the transition. What about the end user who paid good money to own a computer and run whatever he wants on it?
    - rusticpenn 6y ago
      As long as the developers are fine with it, it should be fine I guess.
    - _qulr 6y ago
      > What about the end user who paid good money to own a computer and run whatever he wants on it? You paid good money to Apple. You didn't pay good money to the app developer. iOS app prices are ridiculously low because of the crap store "race to the bottom", which fortunately didn't affect the Mac as much. This is one big reason why Things for iOS is so cheap: the market demands it, not because it's magically cheaper for a dev to make an iOS app. If you take away the Mac-level prices for Mac apps, developers like Cultured Code might go out of business, and then you won't get either version of the app. If Mac app prices start to go as low as iOS app prices, you're going to see almost all developers completely abandon writing native Mac apps, and then Macs might as well just run iOS instead. To forestall that possibility, Mac devs might abandon their much cheaper (or even free) iOS versions to avoid getting undercut by their own products. Paying money to Apple for a Mac doesn't automatically license you to use third-party apps. That's not how it works legally.
      - thefounder 6y ago
        Yeah, sounds familiar..remember the DVD region codes?
        rgovostes 6y ago
        Those don’t bear any similarity to this situation. Region codes allow effectively the same DVDs to be sold at different prices in different markets. iOS and Mac apps are different products altogether; it takes twice as much effort to design the UI for mouse vs touch, write code to use both AppKit and UIKit APIs, etc.
        thefounder 6y ago
        It's just DRM. Cut the bullshit!
    - beowulfey 6y ago
      If a developer didn’t write the application with the intention of supporting your expensive computer, then I think they have the right to block it from working on it if it can be done.
  - musicale 6y ago
    > d) Apple is trying to spare developers who haven't yet addressed the bugs that arise when running their apps, written for a different platform with a completely different user interface idiom, from being inundated with support requests and unhappy reviews. That's an elaboration of what I meant by (b) and I think it's on target.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
im3w1l 6y ago
Sideloading is a loaded word to make you think there is something suspicious and abnormal about installing a program on your own computer without asking for permission.
- gnicholas 6y ago
  This is about allowing developers to control whether their software, which they designed for iOS, can be run on Macs. That seems totally fair, as there would be many reasons that a dev would want to hold off on releasing to Mac when their software was not intended to run on it.
  - emptyparadise 6y ago
    I'd say it's also fair for me to be able to control the $2000 slab of metal and glass on my desk.
    - deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
    - gnicholas 6y ago
      You misunderstand my comment. I was replying to a comment that implied that you were asking permission of the device manufacturer/OS maker, which is typically the relevant gatekeeper when talking about sideloading apps. But here, it's not about that. It's about having paid for an iOS app and thinking that you now have the right to run it on a completely different type of device, and also presumably on many more devices (given how Apple allows installs for any device hooked to a given Apple ID). Honestly, I'm shocked that so many people on HN are downvoting my comment that emphasizes the rights of software developers to not have their proprietary software used on device types that they were never meant to run on.
      - seniorivn 6y ago
        developer can forbid his distributor(Apple) from distribution on other platforms(forbid ios apps on mac) but developer has no power to command how legal owner of software runs it and separately Apple for some reason thinks it's ok to control what binaries can be ran on a general purpose computer they sold
sschueller 6y ago
I predicted this and so did others. However I don't think it would come that quick. Stop buying these systems no matter how much faster they are. Others will copy Apple because they see the money. In the end they decide what you can do with your computer and there will be nothing you can do. It will be too late.
- ChuckNorris89 6y ago
  I never owned Apple products and never will, but some (most?) consumers don't care about the openness of their system and just want to be in a reliable and cozy ecosystem or walled garden if you will, of well polished products, even if it costs a lot and is mostly used for watching netflix and browsing the web which, I guess, is the majority of Apple's customer base. For everyone else who wants full control and ownership of their hardware there's always Linux.
  - e40 6y ago
    I'm curious what computer and cell phone you use?
    - ChuckNorris89 6y ago
      Your average budget gaming laptop running Windows + Linux and an Android phone. Why?
      - e40 6y ago
        It seems to me that people give Microsoft and Google a pass on their BS, but Apple is damned to hell here on HN, with absolute statements like you made.
        ChuckNorris89 6y ago
        What are you even talking about?
fxtentacle 6y ago
While y'all will likely hate it, support costs can easily eat up any profits that you might have had from a reasonably priced app. Selling for $1 on the ios app store is only financially viable for me the developer if everything is standardized so that I never have to deal with any customer-specific manual work. That's why the ability to block ios app execution on Mac is crucially important to keep things profitable for developers. I usually hate Apple for locking things down, but in this case I believe they had to do it, or else risk sacrificing many ios developers.

72 points by neogodless 6y ago

Who knew that Apple would decide to use its DRM? /s > Apple moving to block the unauthorized app installs isn’t necessarily surprising > Apple has given [iOS] developers power to block their apps from running on the Mac — a power that is undermined by sideloading Presumably it's a response to a) piracy/unlicensed use of iOS apps, b) developers who don't want to support macOS, and c) developers who want to charge higher prices to macOS users.

rgovostes 6y ago
(d) Apple is trying to spare developers who haven't yet addressed the bugs that arise when running their apps, written for a different platform with a completely different user interface idiom, from being inundated with support requests and unhappy reviews. I think the answer is a little from each column, but (c) has the strongest weight: some apps, say Cultured Code's Things and The Omni Group's OmniGraffle, are sold as separate Mac and iOS SKUs. Apple would damage their businesses if they allowed the iPad app run on the Mac without the developer approving it. I hope it becomes the norm soon, but we're in an early stage of the transition. It wouldn't surprise me if someone figures out that they simply need to re-sign the binaries to run them, though.
- thefounder 6y ago
  >> Apple would damage their businesses if they allowed the iPad app run on the Mac without the developer approving it. I hope it becomes the norm soon, but we're in an early stage of the transition. What about the end user who paid good money to own a computer and run whatever he wants on it?
  - rusticpenn 6y ago
    As long as the developers are fine with it, it should be fine I guess.
  - _qulr 6y ago
    > What about the end user who paid good money to own a computer and run whatever he wants on it? You paid good money to Apple. You didn't pay good money to the app developer. iOS app prices are ridiculously low because of the crap store "race to the bottom", which fortunately didn't affect the Mac as much. This is one big reason why Things for iOS is so cheap: the market demands it, not because it's magically cheaper for a dev to make an iOS app. If you take away the Mac-level prices for Mac apps, developers like Cultured Code might go out of business, and then you won't get either version of the app. If Mac app prices start to go as low as iOS app prices, you're going to see almost all developers completely abandon writing native Mac apps, and then Macs might as well just run iOS instead. To forestall that possibility, Mac devs might abandon their much cheaper (or even free) iOS versions to avoid getting undercut by their own products. Paying money to Apple for a Mac doesn't automatically license you to use third-party apps. That's not how it works legally.
    - thefounder 6y ago
      Yeah, sounds familiar..remember the DVD region codes?
      - rgovostes 6y ago
        Those don’t bear any similarity to this situation. Region codes allow effectively the same DVDs to be sold at different prices in different markets. iOS and Mac apps are different products altogether; it takes twice as much effort to design the UI for mouse vs touch, write code to use both AppKit and UIKit APIs, etc.
        thefounder 6y ago
        It's just DRM. Cut the bullshit!
  - beowulfey 6y ago
    If a developer didn’t write the application with the intention of supporting your expensive computer, then I think they have the right to block it from working on it if it can be done.
- musicale 6y ago
  > d) Apple is trying to spare developers who haven't yet addressed the bugs that arise when running their apps, written for a different platform with a completely different user interface idiom, from being inundated with support requests and unhappy reviews. That's an elaboration of what I meant by (b) and I think it's on target.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

im3w1l 6y ago

Sideloading is a loaded word to make you think there is something suspicious and abnormal about installing a program on your own computer without asking for permission.

gnicholas 6y ago
This is about allowing developers to control whether their software, which they designed for iOS, can be run on Macs. That seems totally fair, as there would be many reasons that a dev would want to hold off on releasing to Mac when their software was not intended to run on it.
- emptyparadise 6y ago
  I'd say it's also fair for me to be able to control the $2000 slab of metal and glass on my desk.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - gnicholas 6y ago
    You misunderstand my comment. I was replying to a comment that implied that you were asking permission of the device manufacturer/OS maker, which is typically the relevant gatekeeper when talking about sideloading apps. But here, it's not about that. It's about having paid for an iOS app and thinking that you now have the right to run it on a completely different type of device, and also presumably on many more devices (given how Apple allows installs for any device hooked to a given Apple ID). Honestly, I'm shocked that so many people on HN are downvoting my comment that emphasizes the rights of software developers to not have their proprietary software used on device types that they were never meant to run on.
    - seniorivn 6y ago
      developer can forbid his distributor(Apple) from distribution on other platforms(forbid ios apps on mac) but developer has no power to command how legal owner of software runs it and separately Apple for some reason thinks it's ok to control what binaries can be ran on a general purpose computer they sold

sschueller 6y ago

I predicted this and so did others. However I don't think it would come that quick. Stop buying these systems no matter how much faster they are. Others will copy Apple because they see the money. In the end they decide what you can do with your computer and there will be nothing you can do. It will be too late.

ChuckNorris89 6y ago
I never owned Apple products and never will, but some (most?) consumers don't care about the openness of their system and just want to be in a reliable and cozy ecosystem or walled garden if you will, of well polished products, even if it costs a lot and is mostly used for watching netflix and browsing the web which, I guess, is the majority of Apple's customer base. For everyone else who wants full control and ownership of their hardware there's always Linux.
- e40 6y ago
  I'm curious what computer and cell phone you use?
  - ChuckNorris89 6y ago
    Your average budget gaming laptop running Windows + Linux and an Android phone. Why?
    - e40 6y ago
      It seems to me that people give Microsoft and Google a pass on their BS, but Apple is damned to hell here on HN, with absolute statements like you made.
      - ChuckNorris89 6y ago
        What are you even talking about?

fxtentacle 6y ago

While y'all will likely hate it, support costs can easily eat up any profits that you might have had from a reasonably priced app. Selling for $1 on the ios app store is only financially viable for me the developer if everything is standardized so that I never have to deal with any customer-specific manual work. That's why the ability to block ios app execution on Mac is crucially important to keep things profitable for developers. I usually hate Apple for locking things down, but in this case I believe they had to do it, or else risk sacrificing many ios developers.