#41 Bluefish does not have code signature and notarization on MacOS (Catalina and BigSur)
MacOS have security feature called Gatekeeper that restricts running of non-verified software to admin accounts. With introduction of BigSur (11.0) there are even more restrictions, and probably even admin accounts will have issues running Bluefish, like not able to access certain directories and files.
A bit of research showed that code signature and notarization is required in order to be able to run Bluefish under MacOS, starting from Catalina, BigSur and further. Apple Developer Program account ID is needed for this, which cost $99/year atm. There are some exceptions for non-profits, however, it is not straight forward.:
https://developer.apple.com/support/membership-fee-waiver/
Gnome produced code signature for Gimp somehow, so we have to see if we can follow in similar way:
https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/gimp/-/issues/946
Process of notarization is described here:
https://developer.apple.com/documentation/xcode/notarizing_macos_software_before_distribution
I have tried to upload 2.2.12 for notarization, however, obviously upload fails, since I do not have valid Apple Developer ID...
I should note, that Bluefish is broken on BigSur at the moment due outdated gtk+ version we are using (see ticket #35). This can be fixed, however, even if I produce fix, we need to think how to solve code signature issue.
it seems you need to be an official non-profit organization. We'll have to see if the gnome foundation (for example) has such a key, and if it is possible for bluefish to get our software signed by them.
What is the status? Is there any progress?
If Apple is blocking OSS this way, does it make sense to continue support for MacOS? Or has Bluefish received such a notarization?