Thursday, March 3, 2016

Previously Downloaded OS X Installers No Longer Work

Josh Centers:

The Apple Worldwide Developer Relations Intermediate Certificate is required for all apps in the Mac App Store, including OS X installers. When used to sign an app, the certificate enables OS X to confirm that the app has not been corrupted or modified by an attacker. This certificate expired on 14 February 2016, causing error dialogs and preventing some apps from launching. Most apps affected have already been updated with the new certificate. But if you downloaded an OS X installer in case of trouble, you may be in for a surprise the next time you try to use it.

[…]

Those who have created any bootable install disks for OS X will need to recreate them with the new installers.

Previously: More Mac App Store Certificate Problems.

Update (2016-03-03): Jeff Johnson:

Signing code with an expiring cert is not a mistake. Certs expire, that is known in advance. It is planned obsolescence.

Katie Floyd:

So, I’m now in the process of re-downloading gigabytes of data, again. That is, assuming you’re allowed to download the Installers. See, Apple won’t allow a newer Mac to download versions of OS X that aren’t compatible with that Mac.

5 Comments RSS · Twitter

It might not be a mistake, but it's still wrong.

"It might not be a mistake, but it's still wrong."

It might be intended behavior. But it's still a mistake.

When do the installers actually fail? I have been able to launch and initiate the installation process using previously downloaded installers for Mountain Lion, Mavericks, and Yosemite on a system running Snow Leopard. Does the certificate get evaluated later in the installation process?

Just curious.

"When do the installers actually fail? I have been able to launch and initiate the installation process using previously downloaded installers for Mountain Lion, Mavericks, and Yosemite on a system running Snow Leopard."

They fail on launch, reporting that they've expired. I've encountered this behavior. And it's not just this current February 14th thing. I've hit this in the past with saved installers.

All depends on the expiration date of the cert.

It's a pretty horrendous, and as Lukas says, simply wrong practice. And as Katie Floyd notes, it can actually leave some folks SOL.

[…] However, much remains to be done. The store apps themselves need work, as do the underlying OS services. The Mac App Store still lags behind, without support for gifting apps or TestFlight, and […]

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