[Openmcl-devel] Apple To Require Sandboxing For Mac App Store Apps - Slashdot

[Robert Goldman]

On 11/7/11 Nov 7 -1:49 PM, Tim Bradshaw wrote:
> On 7 Nov 2011, at 15:53, Tom Emerson <tremerson at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
>> I'm a bit confused by the question: the whole point of the sandbox is to minimize the detrimental impact of a rogue third-party application on a user's computer. Presumably there is an implicit trust between Apple and its users (i.e., I trust that Apple-authored software is not going to install a virus or otherwise attempt to steal information) that does not exist with third parties.
>>
> 
> That's one purpose.  Another, and probably more common, purpose is to handle the case where a well-meaning but not bug-free application gets handed something toxic which causes it, in turn, to do something bad.  That, of course, is a very common problem indeed, and probably what is driving sandboxing.  I may trust Apple to be well-meaning: I certainly don't trust their code to be bug-free, any more than I trust anyone's.
> 
> As I said before: what they need is a rating / classification system which will let you understand what privileges an application will be given.

As a user of an Android phone, I would not endorse this as a panacea.
It burdens the users with a flood of information, of dubious usefulness
(even the current set of privilege classes is a lot, and it is quite
gross compared to a useful ACL scheme), and which most users are
unprepared to manage.  It seems like a far-from-optimal point in the
complexity versus information tradeoff.

Indeed, I am far from convinced that anything more than the "Apple let
it into the walled garden or not" bit will be useful to the vast
majority of users (present company likely excepted).

Best,
r