7 ms·

I understand that you're doing it on principle, but for a software development team, 99$/year is a really minuscule price to pay to be able to build / notarise

• hamandcheese 2y ago
  Adding signing as a requirement can easily make what was once a very simple distribution mechanism into something much more complex - now you need manage signing certificates and keys to be able to build your thing. The cost is far far higher than the price.
  • hkpack 2y ago
    But it doesn't in practice. I develop and distribute few free apps for macOS, and building / notarising is never a problem.
    • makeitdouble 2y ago
      You seem to be comparing a single dev sending apps to the world vs a corporate team pushing to employees (if I get parent's case right). In most cases, just involving account management makes the corporate case 10x more of a PITA. Doing things in a corporate environment is a different game altogether.
    • JamesonNetworks 2y ago
      In contrast to this point, as long as I use Xcode and do the same thing I've always done allowing it to manage provisioning and everything else, I don't have a problem. However, I want to use CI/CD. Have you seen what kind of access you have to give fastlane? It's pretty wild. And even after giving it the keys to the kingdom, it still didn't work. Integrating apple code signing with CI/CD is really hard, full of very strange error messages and incantations to make it "work".
      • hkpack 2y ago
        I don't know about fastlane, since my CI/CD is just a shell script, and signing and notarising is as hard as (checking the script) running `codesign ...` followed by `notarytool submit ... --wait` Yes, you need to put keys on the build server for the "Developer ID Application" (which is what you need to distribute apps outside of AppStore) signature to work. You do not need to give any special access to anything else beyond that. Anyway, it is indeed more difficult than cross-build for Darwin from linux and call it a day.
    • mvdtnz 2y ago
      [flagged]
    • 0xCE0 2y ago
      Code signing is absolutely disgusting practically and philosophically. It has very reasonable and good intent behind it, but the practical implementations cause great suffering and sadness both for developers (cert management, cost, tools) and end-users (freedom of computing). It is ugly: https://hearsum.ca/posts/history-of-code-signing-at-mozilla/ https://hearsum.ca/posts/history-of-code-signing-at-mozilla/
    • bshacklett 2y ago
      Do you distribute OSS software which requires notarizing? If so, have you found a way to let the community build the software without a paid developer account? I would be very interested in a solution which allows OSS development, relying on protected APIs without requiring that anyone who builds the app to have a paid developer account.
  • ehutch79 2y ago
    I take it you feel the trade off for dev team inconvenience, vs end user security, is not worth it?
    • hamandcheese 2y ago
      I'm just observing that the cost is a lot higher than $99/year. I do this professionally, I maintain macOS CI workers for my employer. Apple doesn't make it easy.
    • makeitdouble 2y ago
      They're talking about internal software for internal users. It can be made insanely secure, but that surely isn't the primary concern in this case.
• ryandrake 2y ago
  The principle is what matters. The amount is not the issue. The issue is that there is a cost at all. "It's so cheap" is never an excuse for charging for something that should be free. In this case, running software you have no intent to charge for, on your computer. It's as if someone started charging $0.01/month for breathable air. "But $0.01 is trivial," would not excuse it.
  • hkpack 2y ago
    The commenter I replied to employed by a business, develops software and distributes it within a team of engineers with Macs. For your personal needs, you do not need to pay anything for building and using apps locally.
    • bshacklett 2y ago
      Untrue. There are specific APIs which require notarization , regardless of usage. Credential autofill is one such API.
  • ethersteeds 2y ago
    It costs money, and isn't free, for a reason you're not acknowledging. I don't think it's a major profit center for Apple. It's about setting a higher floor for malicious actors than "random botnet residential IP + a captcha solving service". It's about proving some semblance of identity through a card number and a transaction that goes through without a chargeback. As the case upthread shows, there's plenty to dislike about a system that inhibits running code built for personal use. And it's obviously neither foolproof nor without collateral damage. Reasonable people can debate if it's worth it. But it still ought be acknowledged that the motivations are closer to the reason you have to identify yourself and pay a nominal fee to drive a vehicle on public roads.
    • eviks 2y ago
      > But it still ought be acknowledged that the motivations are closer to the reason Since this isn't true, no acknowledgement required, it doesn't need to be a "major" profit center to magically become a benevolent feature
• joezydeco 2y ago
  The tool is built deep in our CI/CD chain. The whole thing is a house of cards built on a massive pile of tinder next to an open drum of kerosene. You want me to integrate XCode into that? Last time I tried setting up an Apple developer license inside a large corporation, one that they paid for and not tied to me or my credit card, it was also a nightmare. And yes, it's also on principle.
  • plorkyeran 2y ago
    Who said anything about Xcode? The codesign tool is part of macOS, not Xcode. The CLI tool for notarization is bundled with Xcode, but you don't have to use it; they have an official REST API that you can use directly.
    • deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
    • joezydeco 2y ago
      Do you have any notes on how to run it inside a Gitlab pipeline via a Linux Docker instance? I'd love to learn how to do this, then.
• jasonjayr 2y ago
  Sure it's trivial, but it is tacit acceptance that you need permission to make a program on their platform. Permission that needs to be renewed year over year. Permission to earn a living on this platform. Permission that can be revoked for any reason, including being compelled by someone with more power than Apple.
  • hkpack 2y ago
    It is permission to _distribute to others_, you can build and run on your own computer without a problem. Once signed, binary will work forever, you only need active subscription when you need to re-sign / re-notarise.
    • jasonjayr 2y ago
      They can revoke a signature too.
      • hkpack 2y ago
        If your signature is compromised and you start signing malware then yes. That's the whole purpose of it. Do you have any evidence that it happened in any different circumstances at least once?
• NegativeK 2y ago
  $99/year for one of the basic uses of a computer isn't okay.
  • dwaite 2y ago
    Distributing software is not what I would call one of the basic uses of a computer.