I used to be sympathetic to complaints about not wanting to pay the developer account fee. But when you’re vibe coding, you’re probably paying a good chunk of change to your LLM supplier of choice every month, and the yearly developer account fee seems minor in comparison
Also, it’s just such a bad security precedent. This page describes the error you get as “the typical macOS Gatekeeper warning”, as though it were just another piece of corporate silliness, like clicking through a EULA.
Anyway, I don't see a problem with getting it out the door. People can just choose not to install it if they don't like it. I mean that's the whole idea of being early anyway, isn't it? Don't like a crappy bodged together UI? Don't like a lack of support? Don't like an unsigned app? You can wait until it has those things according to your preferences. In the meantime, the creator gets real users and feedback ASAP.
Right now it's closed source binary with a big fat "DOWNLOAD FOR FREE" button and instructions casually telling you to disable the last barrier between your system and persistent malware. Nobody should recommend this to anybody
Is that a US thing? Because in the UK you just get one for free - Companies House sends the info over to them, and a couple of days later it is available to search
Where are these displayed?
I just downloaded your app and ran it through hopper. There is a LOT of embedded Apple Script. I would never run an app like this with SIP disabled or without an active network blocker.
Your app requires direct access to major OS components: code signing, even during alpha should be a requirement.
It is my machine and I paid for it, why does the OS care about what I do with it? The only thing this leads to is making sure your customers grow into good little lemmings.
For everyone else it's probably sane to have it, works as a decent filter so someone not tech-savvy don't get hurt by installing malware disguised as an app, one would just need to state incredible features that almost any normal user would like to have, and make them click to install. Gatekeeper diminishes that risk by a lot unless you learn how to bypass it, which requires you having decent skills and probably wouldn't fall for the bullshit that malware apps try to bait people with.
Apple has a lot to be criticized for but gatekeeper (and SIP) isn't that.
People like and need the apple sandbox. Others need an unlocked *nix machines
I've never ended up with undesired software on my system except for under two circumstances: either (a) it's installed by the OS vendor, or (b) some proprietary indie software I used got bought by a shady company who now wants to spy on me and sell my data. Systems like Gatekeeper don't protect against either.
> Also, it’s just such a bad security precedent. This page describes the error you get as “the typical macOS Gatekeeper warning”, as though it were just another piece of corporate silliness, like clicking through a EULA.
It mostly is another piece of corporate silliness. For most people it rarely does something useful. But I agree; if you're courting normie users you should just pony up and get your code signed and notarized. Otherwise just tell people that if they don't already know what Gatekeeper is and understand the risks of bypassing it as well as how to do so, your software isn't for them.
Even though it's more troublesome to submit apps to App Store, it's one signal that the app is not a malware.
In AI conversations, people often forget that at the end of a day, an actual human needs to use your stuff.
Let’s not forget when Apple’s certificate server was down and suddenly you couldn’t launch apps on macOS, to say nothing of the abuse of user rights.
I applaud that they didn't kowtow to Apple's attempt to exercise control over their app and extort money from them. Why should we accede to policies that are designed to exploit us developers?
We developers add the real value to a platform. Don't believe me? Look up on how popular Sailfish OS or Windows Mobile OS is and why they failed or struggle. Apple should be grateful to this developer that they seek to add value to their platform instead of trying to figure out money grubbing ways on how to control and exploit them. (Of course, ultimately it is the users of the platform who are exploited - all charges by Apple are ultimately bore by them when they purchase an app through the App Store).
It's just sad that whether you are a user or a developer, Apple Fanbois would rather (ignorantly) place Apple's interest over their own consumer rights.
You think notarizing an app is "placing Apple's interest over" our own?
Do you not realize that spending money on other useful services makes it harder, not easier, to waste on dev fees?
If you really want to ban Gatekeeper you can. sudo spctl --master-disable
As the saying goes about being careful, measure twice and cut once.
It IS another piece of corporate silliness. Though silliness is an extremely charitable word for what it really is
Cheering on the loss of autonomy and control over our own computers under the guise of 'silliness' is disgusting
Why don’t you purchase your own developer account and sign it yourself if you trust it? Or are you saying them paying Apple $100/yr in perpetuity is what will make you trust it?
Meanwhile, I'm running Claude Code and asking it to make me stupid bespoke things that only I want and I'm not spamming the internet with those tools because they aren't novel or useful for most people and you can have Claude Code build a version for the way that you work.
Go away, green accounts. Everyone is pretty tired of your presence.
I get the frustration with the overload of new vibe-coded tools, but this particular attitude towards new people - can we not?
https://sindresorhus.com/supercharge
I was skeptical that I’d find it useful since I can do all of these shell commands and such, but one feature I like is being able to effectively pare the feature set down to just what you need, making for a small but very useful menu.
I might consider adding this in a future release, although at this point I'm focusing on keeping the app's footprint minimal, so every feature addition has to be carefully considered :)
- Website looks great overall, but the fixed and overlaid header title is awkward and hurts readability for not much benefit.
- Battery Health on my M3 Max MBP reads as "1%", when System Report shows Condition: Normal, Maximum Capacity: 100%. What is this reading from?
- Handy password generator is great; any chance of an option for "correct horse" [0] style passwords? I find these are preferable for reasonably secure passwords which can still be remembered or hand-typed as needed.
Looking forward to seeing how the app evolves!
Yes, the pre-release is intended for testing purposes, so thanks for bringing the battery health issue to my attention. It is calculated from the the battery's reported design capacity and current capacity, but the reported values seem to be unreliable across different systems.
The password generator suggestion is interesting, but I intentionally gave the user only one password generator option in the base version of the app - the most secure one :)
An example is I have my airpods bound to ctrl+alt+b to connect via Bluetooth. This is to have it yank back control from my android phone.
Pre-release feedback from the community is definitely valuable though. I didn't know this part is the most diffcult.
