screen recording permission dialog

[OpenXTalkPaul]

If the apps use the same identifier (which I think we are using separate identifiers now), then that might be a problem for LaunchServices for correctly identify the app (and the hardware permissions it should be allowed to request).

It's a problem when doing any modifying of .app bundles, things like changing the App's icon, where the 'fix' is to force the App to be re-read by launch services after making a change. One quick way to force that, without typing any command lines, is to .zip the app in the Mac Finder, then delete the original .app, and finally expand the .zip copy of the app, at which point launch services should've read those finer details anew.

Anyway the problem with 'export snapshot' may be (slightly) deeper than getting macOS to ask user hardware access permission once, and only once. With the right conditions we know that does indeed work as expected. But 'Export snapshot' probably needs some tweaking, updating in the Engine source.

[neville]

If all this 'sandboxing' is supposed to in some way enhance the security of MacOS... but it's ultimately just changing lines of a glorified text file to get around these security prompts? (Doesn't seem very 'secure') - or perhaps it's secure in as much as, nobody knows how to create new ones easily - so it's only secure because of that?

Ah not quite that simple. The developer requests permissions in the plist. For sale in the Apple Store, Apple has to approve the requests. When the user launches the app for the first time, she has to approve the request if it might access private information. And if anyone attempts to change the plist, codesigning is broken, and the app won't work. Unfortunately the whole business of code signing, and now Notarising and Stapling, has become a nightmare for developers.

BTW the Xcode plist editor is quite human-friendly, it only has a - what 6GB footprint. Xcode does do a few other things

[OpenXTalkPaul]

BTW the Xcode plist editor is quite human-friendly, it only has a - what 6GB footprint. Xcode does do a few other things

Hah! Yes, X-Code is a massive disk hogging beast, specially when you need like 3 or 4 versions of it just to get our thing to even try to compile. ProperTree and PListEdit are pretty good too and they're a much smaller footprint.
Also yes Code-Signing is a nightmare and I'm skeptical that 'making us all more secure' is the real reason for they way Apple set up their version of it.