I know I probably should quit using the ‘Packages’ app, but it has been very handy and worked up until now (and is still recommended in the JUCE tutorials)… except maybe I made the mistake to update my Mac build laptop to Sonoma/XCode15 (even though I’m fairly certain I used the same toolset for my previous release without issues).
I am just wondering if anybody else experienced this issue:
I am building .vst3/.component/.app based on Juce 7.0.3 - the output of the builds is a single file package container for each of those as I would expect.
I’m doing all the usual code signing/stamping/notarization as you would expect.
However, after running the created .pkg installer I started to see new issues that didn’t happen the last time I created a release package (with exact same settings other than updated plugin builds/build numbers) - The installed vst3 file (inside macintosh HD/library/audio/plug-ins/vst3) is now shown as a folder as is the .component file… and DAWs are unable to scan/load the vst3 version, however the component folder version is properly scanned and the plugin is running fine even though it’s presented as a folder in finder.
The installed .app is able to launch but the app icon is no longer properly displayed (vs the source .app file correctly showing the icon) - even though looking inside the installed .app contents I can see the correct application icon inside the resources folder.
Possibly this is something that changed in Mac OS that breaks ‘Packages’ v1.2.10.
Something else I noticed is that the ‘Presentation’ tab of the project doesn’t display the steps items correctly in the preview window:
The only thing that is different in the build process vs my previous release is that I added the -Wl -ld_classic linker options because of an issue with targeting OS below 12 requires it apparently… although I see Xcode 15.1 is just released that might possibly remove that requirement.
Because the app is not up to date with the latest OS - and generally relying on another 3rd party tool is best avoided if it can be done with the native tools.
The packages app is basically a UI wrapper for built in Mac OS tools that you can control via scripts - it’s very handy for sure, but I don’t think we can rely on the developer to keep it up to date.
FYI - I rebuilt using an older release of Packages that I have on a Mac OS 12.x machine and everything worked correctly including the installed plugins appearing as single files (containers) and scanning properly in the usual DAWs I test with.
I will contact the developer, but if I can avoid to rely on this 3rd party app if I can use the Mac OS built in tools it’s best for avoiding any future issues. Clearly it has a bug with Sonoma currently. It seems the last downloadable build update was in 2022, although there is more recent activity in the github repo (July this year).
So maybe building from source could be an option.
You should be able to unpack any pkg using pkgutil. I think the command is pkgutil --expand <path/to/installer.pkg> <directory/to/dump/contents/> but check the man-page for more info.
Hi,
Did you make any progress with getting Packages to work in MacOS Sonoma? I’m coming across that same issue now (5 months later) so Packages looks abandoned to me. I was able to get the presentation tab working with the development version (http://s.sudre.free.fr/files/Packages_1211_dev.dmg) but now the signing is not working when I set a Certificate with the project. Project > Distribution > xar fails with a mysterious “Uknown error” (although the certificate is working perfectly with codesign and productsign).
Thanks Rail. I’m doing that too (I have the badge showing as well) but I’m still getting this mysterious error at the "Project > Distribution > xar " step when I build it .
Thanks again Rail. I was finally able to sign the pkg with productsign in the command line, after building it in Packages without the certificate. When I set the certificate (Installer ID) in Packages though, it still gives me this strange error in the xar step. I’m not aware of doing anything unusual. I just have 4 sections: AU, VST, VST3 and Standalone with files to install in the Payload tab.
Sorry for late response, I’m also using the unofficial development build to get it to present the menu correctly in Sonoma. For code signing I always do it via the command line anyway.
I had one issue (installed plugin appearing as a folder (even the au)) in the past with installation of au/vst3 on Mac which I thought was related to Sonoma/Packages combination, but it turned out to be a permissions issue with the permissions in my build folder being too restrictive.
Still relying on this tool for the moment.
.