About the "product" element and the "Version" column of System Information.app
About the "product" element and the "Version" column of System Information.app
- Subject: About the "product" element and the "Version" column of System Information.app
- From: Stephane Sudre <email@hidden>
- Date: Tue, 19 Jul 2016 15:52:45 +0200
Problem:
--------
The "product" element is officially documented to be reserved for
application distributed via the (Mac) App Store but the System
Information application is using it as if it was allowed to all
distributions.
Side problem
------------
The format of the version string is completely inconsistent between
Apple software components (and even within the same software
application).
Detail:
-------
• According to the "Distribution XML Reference" documentation
(https://developer.apple.com/library/mac/documentation/DeveloperTools/Reference/DistributionDefinitionRef/Chapters/Distribution_XML_Ref.html),
the "product" element is "Used for distributing via the App Store.".
When you visit the "Software > Installations section" of the "System
Information" application (/Applications/Utilities), the Version column
list all installations (App Store or not). For software that is not
part of the OS or distributed via the (Mac) App Store, the cell is
empty.
This can be confusing to end-users.
• In addition to that, there's no coherency when it comes to the
format of the string displayed in the "Version" column (i.e. the
string provided via the "version" attribute).
e.g.
AirPort Utility 6,2 (separator is ',')
AirPort Utility 6.3.1 (separator is '.')
Core Suggestions Configuration Data 747 (that's more a build number
than a version IMHO)
Gatekeeper Configuration Data 1,0
Gatekeeper Configuration Data 90
XProtectPlistConfigData 1,0 (it's always 1,0 which is an issue by itself).
• Add to the confusion that some software components not distributed
via the App Store are apparently built to include the "product"
element (e.g. Oracle VM VirtualBox).
Questions:
----------
If the "product" element is supposed to be for distribution via the
App Store, how comes it can be used by apps not distributed via the
App Store?
Is there any plan to bring some coherency to the version values for
the Apple components?
Is there a plan to improve the way 3rd Party components are listed?
Because right now, without the version value, the records are not
really that useful (for instance, you cannot figure out the version
history of installations).
Radar: #27424761
_______________________________________________
Do not post admin requests to the list. They will be ignored.
Installer-dev mailing list (email@hidden)
Help/Unsubscribe/Update your Subscription:
This email sent to email@hidden