I have a question about how I can update my application in such a
way that when the new version runs, the user is asked if they would
like to "Change All".
Currently what happens is when my application is updated, this
"Change All" dialog never appears, and the poor user then needs to
click "Allow Always" on every individual keychain item.
I've read the archives and saw that these files were important for
this process:
My application does *NOT* appear in these. Do I need to do
something special to be added?
The CodeEquivalenceCandidates file tells the (Apple) Installer to
automagically establish code equivalences during (upgrade) installs.
Essentially, if a (code) file gets changed during an Installer run,
and it's on that list, and the Installer runs as root (after the user
okayed the Admin dialog), then Installer tells the system that the old
and new programs are equivalent. If that works out, you won't see a
"Change All" dialog but you won't see any other dialog either. (There
is currently no canonical way for third parties to get on this list,
other than pestering your DTS guy I suppose. Note that *removing* the
CodeEquivalenceCandidates file is equivalent to putting everything on
it. But the next software update is likely to re-create the file.)
If a program asks for a keychain item that has been "okayed" for an
earlier version, then the system puts up the "Change All" dialog. You
don't need to be on the Candidates list for this to work. Note that
the resulting equivalence only applies to the user clicking the
"Change All" button (obviously).
A clue that might help is after my app is updated and access is
granted to the keychain item, if I look at the "Access Control"
sheet of the entry in keychain access, I see my application listed
twice. One version is "unknown", and the other is the correct new
version.
An "unknown" version usually means that the remembered path-to that
program doesn't have the program there, any more. The version isn't
actually remembered in the item's ACL; only the code hash and path
are. So Keychain Access just looks where the path points and fishes
out the version - or says "unknown" if it can't for some reason.
What this tells me is that OS X doesn't realize that the two apps
are "equivalent". It is as if OS X thinks they are completely
different applications.
The canonical logic for this goes vaguely like this: if the requesting
code has the same name as valid ACL entry, but not the same code hash
(which would allow access implicitly), then the system puts up the
"Change All" dialog (if it can, obviously - but if it can put up the
"Always Allow" dialog, it should be able to put up "Change All", too).
There's not much wiggle room here; chances are that the recorded name
of the App is different. Note that the name (as of Tiger) is simply
the filename (or name of the bundle directory), so if you rename it,
you won't get a match. (In other words, the system won't take the
canonical name from the Info.plist. It takes the directory/file name.)
All of this will change, incidentally, in Leopard with the advent of
Code Signing. Learn how to sign your code, and you'll never see those
silly dialogs again.
Cheers
-- perry
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Perry The Cynic email@hidden
To a blind optimist, an optimistic realist must seem like an Accursed
Cynic.
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