360 MacDev: Jay "saurik" Freeman on the jailbreak store for Mac apps
When it comes to jailbreaking, there's probably no name as familiar to the development community than that of Jay "saurik" Freeman. Jay is the brain behind the Cydia App Store, and this morning he gave the attendees of 360|MacDev an overview of his upcoming jailbreak store for Mac OS X, cycript, and Cydia Substrate.
Currently, Cydia Installer has been used by about 10% of all iPhone users, or about 10 million devices. There are well over 30,000 packages available for iOS, and a lot of open source material can be downloaded from Cydia. He refers to Cydia as a store for things that are not apps, but extensions of what iOS devices can do.
Freeman felt that the same type of store would be useful for Mac OS X devices; the result is a Mac Cydia, which will be available "within weeks." With today's news that the Mac App Store will not support in-app purchases, something that is critical to the freemium app model that is so successful in the iOS world, a Mac Cydia might be just the web store for a number of Mac developers.
Before discussing the Mac Cydia, however, Freeman spent quite a while taking Apple to task for their horrible developer documentation and for the restrictions that are common in the Apple development world. He foresees many of Apple's restrictions moving to the Mac App Store.
Developers who are interested in getting their products into Mac Cydia were told to contact an employee at patrick at saurikit.com for further details.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Nintendo Tim said 5:33PM on 12-10-2010
Epic beard is epic.
Seriously, I can't get over Jay's beard. It always befuddles me.
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Soutrik B. said 5:46PM on 12-10-2010
I'm not sure I understand the point of this. The Mac isn't a walled garden like the iPhone. You can already install any apps you want from the internet...
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MikeLive said 5:46PM on 12-10-2010
So, he's going to start another apt-based package system for Mac? There's already a bunch, and none are very easy. What's the point?
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Risto T said 6:05PM on 12-10-2010
Can't wait to see the UI. Hard to top the sheer ugliness and lack of usability of Cydia for iOS, but I am sure he will find a way.
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LD said 6:02PM on 12-10-2010
Doesn't this already exist and isn't it called Bodega?
http://appbodega.com/
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Jose said 6:10PM on 12-10-2010
Well if it's as buggy half-baked solution as iOS Cydia (let's face it, it's got problems) why do we need it?
Most useful Mac software is one easy download and click away.
I don't need to have more crappy things trying to break my OSX system because, in contrast to iOS, there's no easy "Restore" button.
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Jeff said 6:14PM on 12-10-2010
I'm going to go with the theory that Cydia now makes him and others a good pile of cash, and he wants to capitalize on the "brand recognition" of Cydia on the Mac as well.
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Perspective said 7:17PM on 12-10-2010
So a jailbroken Mac is one in which you can install any software right? So. . .am I missing something?
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maxats said 9:29PM on 12-10-2010
There's no such thing. Mac's aren't a closed system, so a "Jailbroken Mac" is not an applicable term.
Jon said 11:21PM on 12-10-2010
@maxats,
whoosh!
Rob said 7:21PM on 12-10-2010
Does this mean we'll be able to use Macs with different carriers now?
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solarpos said 7:36PM on 12-10-2010
Unnecessary, just how he must feel about a razor.
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Bob said 8:26PM on 12-10-2010
So I'm going to follow the guidance of this scumwad on everything he tells us to do. Great. It's bad enough that Cydia threatens the security of every iPhone out there with their jailbreaks. And now he wants to do this to the Mac.
I need jerks like this guy like a hole in my head.
Remember, he knows more than you do. Just ask him. So who am I to trust? This really handsome guy or Steve Jobs? The answer for me is self-evident.
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oZ said 1:23PM on 12-11-2010
"It's bad enough that Cydia threatens the security of every iPhone out there with their jailbreaks"
Please tell me you're a troll.
Milford said 9:02PM on 12-10-2010
That shirt isn't funny. It's like Bill Gates wearing a shirt with a picture of a BSoD.
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Noah Ramon said 10:14PM on 12-10-2010
As I've pointed out previously, we've HAD a "Cydia for the Mac". It was called "ftp://sumex-aim.stanford.edu/info-mac/".
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Jay Freeman (saurik) said 11:47PM on 12-10-2010
I don't understand why the people in the comments are having a hard time grasping this, but the point is to provide a market for the kinds of "modifications to third party software" that people like writing on jailbroken iPhones, and to allow people to install those modifications in a way that reasonably makes sense. I have no clue why people are trying to liken this to Fink (the APT/dpkg already existing, comment), or what this possibly has to do with AppBodega (Cydia is not an App Store: you don't get "apps" from Cydia, you get cool hacks). *sigh*
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shippo0708 said 11:54AM on 12-11-2010
Most of the people who comment complaining about this and that dont even know the difference between this and that so they just comment based on what they think they know. But the comments on here arent as bad as the ones on iClarified right now, whooo those are getting horrible -_-
I do hope we see some interface to the iPhone Cydia in the mac Cydia tho :P you know like to sync the packages we've installed or something
hachu said 4:23PM on 12-11-2010
To which platform do you claim to be providing a "market for cool hacks" and "not an app store"?
Cydia on the Mac?
Cydia on iOS?
From a common user's standpoint, Cydia on iOS IS an app store. Despite that you and I know a decent number of the items made available are themes and MobileSubstrate-based hacks, the focus of the user is still on, "look at what interesting SMS app I just got!" or "look at what I can do with this Bluetooth app thingie! I can send files over bluetooth now!" or "My iPhone can replace my MiFi!"
As for the Mac...
There isn't a distribution or lockdown problem. If you want to distribute something, post it on a web page and tell people.
I think that trying to provide a monkey-patching solution for the desktop OS isn't going to work as well as it did on the mobile device. The apps on the desktop are much more complex. So making stable hacks that work will be much more difficult.
lotech said 3:47PM on 12-12-2010
I appreciate that Cydia exists but it's far from a perfect program.
I think its disappointing that Cydia is the monopoly for installers since you gobbled up Rock - months later the best parts of Rock are still not included in Cydia. Multitasking has been round for nearly half a year and yet still Cydia restarts from scratch when you reopen - oh, and then theres the iPad -support is still minimal.
I'd rather Cydia was open or that there was a 2nd choice (when installing a JB) - competition keeps apps and their developers on their toes.