Mac OS X 10.8 restricted to App Store, signed apps by default
osnews.com
osnews.com
The reality: 10.8 by default only runs apps which were either downloaded from the App Store, with the iOS-style sandboxing that will require, or signed with Apple's new GateKeeper service, and otherwise a traditional Mac app.
Those who condemn this as a flagrant loss of freedom are lost in the philosophical weeds. The conventional wisdom before the iPhone was that native apps were all but dead anyway, and the browser was the future. The iPhone's App Store and attendant restrictions singlehandedly revived the concept of consumers installing software. Meanwhile, the Mac is gaining enough market share that it's now clearly a target for malware. Code signing is about as open as you can get while still tamping down nasty code (and let me stress again that GateKeeper is way more freeform than anything on iOS).
If there are alternate solutions to these issues, it would be fascinating to hear them. Otherwise, well, it's easy to criticize from the bleachers.
> When Apple first unveiled the Mac App Store, many - including myself - were concerned what it would mean for the future of the general purpose computer. It felt like a first step towards losing control and ownership over our own computers, a dreaded future where everything we do on our machines is curated, tracked, and monitored by companies who want to squeeze ever more money from us, and governments who want to control us.
> We're allowing an entire generation to be raised with the idea that you do not own software, that you do not own hardware, that you are not allowed to tinker with the magic smiles machine. This is going to come back to bite us in the ass in the future, when we're going to be faced with a shortage of low-level, hardcore programmers.
In many ways, Richard Stallman has been right all along, and slowly, many of his fears are coming true.
The cloud has become a utility, like electricity. The cloud goes down, I can't access my apps. The electricity goes out, I can't turn on my machine. This is the idea that the next generation will be raised with.
Last I heard, you can sign your app with a free developer key. It absolutely does not have to be on the app store. And there's a switch in system preferences that lets you disable this whole verification process altogether (or if you want don't want to disable it, but want to make an exception, you can right click on an executable and press 'open' or open it via terminal, instead of double clicking on it).
And you know what? If some day, for some reason, Apple does decide to lock out hackers and tinkerers from their systems, somehow I doubt Apple's stock-holders will lose any sleep over it. For all the kvetching that I frequently hear from the HN crowd at large about "let the market decide", it's surprising how quickly that attitude vanishes when "the market" decides against you.
(For what it's worth, there was a time when developers had to lay out far more than the average user for capable systems. It's only relatively recently that standard consumer machines could stand in for a dev box. I wouldn't be surprised if the future has developers, once again, paying premium dolar for hardware.)
There is a setting to "only install Appstore Apps" but it is not the default.
Both signed and AppStore apps are runnable by default.
That said (and as a Mac fan), I don't like this move.
Could or would? They could at any point. That's not what this (old) news says though. Gatekeeper requires application signing, which is entirely different than "shutting off non-store software completely." All App Store apps are signed by default, which is why the news makes this distinction.
"That said (and as a Mac fan), I don't like this move."
Please, ask yourself why. Reflect on it, because I think a lot of the apprehension is misguided.
App signing is a good thing. Developers have an entirely different set of needs from the general computing public. We represent a small percentage of said population. So why should computers be designed with defaults that suit us, when we have the ability to change them (easily)?
The Flashback virus should be a wake up call to those still clinging to the notion that the current situation is sustainable. It's not. Flashback would have been stopped by app signing. Even if a malicious signed app does make it through to the public, the ability to revoke their cert means you can take the app offline quickly.
This is good for the vast majority of computer users. Is it less open? Yes, but it's a step forward from a safety perspective. You have to choose your priorities. What we have now isn't working.
Apple already contends that OS X can't legally run on generic PC hardware, and has already taken x86 Mac cloners to court over this and won, so they know they've got the law on their side when it comes to control of their OS, where it can run, and what can run it.
The next logical step is to take control of what can run on it. With the recent OS X "virus" scare, the issue has become all the more urgent, as the public's perception of its security has been damaged and a signed-app "solution" seems like the easiest way to restore confidence in it.
As far as requiring signed code goes, though, their other devices already all require it, so I'm assuming, based on their moves so far, that it isn't far off on the laptop/desktop end. That it's an option (on by default) in 10.8 makes me think that, one day, the option to run unsigned code in OS X will disappear entirely.
OS X Lion costs $29. Windows 7 costs $119-219, depending on which edition you get.
While it's possible to buy a machine without Windows, the selection tends to be quite limited, particularly for notebooks. Assembling your own from parts is an option for desktop machines, but again not really for notebooks.
Even if there was a few hundred dollar premium, keep it in perspective. How smart is it to be fretting over a few hundred bucks with respect to a tool that you will likely use for a year or two, for a significant % of your waking hours, and upon which you depend for your most of your income?
There aren't restrictions on what signed apps can do.
There is nothing wrong with predictions, just don’t pretend they are not.