Starting with OS X Mountain Lion, Apple introduced Gatekeeper so users couldn’t easily install downloaded apps from outside the Mac App Store.
10.7-10.8 recent Mac's have Internet Recovery, it is downloaded from Apple's servers. Internet Recovery for whole drive repair/format and install of original factory OS X version if 10.7 or 10.8. 10.7-10.8 upgraded Mac's with no Internet Recovery can use This Method their own or matching OS X version machine. Ensure your Mac and all your apps are fully up-to-date: From the menu bar on your Mac, go to Software Update. Download and install any available updates to macOS. Now open the Mac App Store and select Updates from the sidebar. Download and install any available updates to your apps.
When someone downloads an app from somewhere other than the Mac App Store they will get one of a few warning messages depending on what security settings they’ve set in System Preferences. We’ll show users how to set the security settings in Security & Privacy section of the OS X System Preferences using any version of OS X after Mountain Lion so they can install downloaded apps from outside the Mac App Store.
Why Can’t I Install 3rd-Party Apps By Default?
If you don’t care about why this works, skip to the next section. Here’s why Apple sets OS X to disallow 3rd-party apps by default, for those who like to understand why things work as they do.
Downloaded From Internet
Cynics will say that Apple does this because they don’t get a 30% cut from applications bought directly from third-party apps instead of their curated app store. A $10 app nets Apple $3 and the developer gets only $7. The developer gets the entire $10 if the app is sold directly.
Apple says they set things blocking third-party apps because they want to protect users who might install downloaded apps with malware or viruses. They take the 30% cut to cover the cost of hosting the Mac App Store and testing apps to keep malware out of the store. In other words, they want to help protect us from our own mistakes.
Apple offers three setting options in the Security & Privacy Settings in System Preferences. Apple set the default to help protect users from Malware or to lock down computers depending on which explanation you prefer.
Apple created Gatekeeper, a program to protect users from Malware. Developers can get a security certificate from Apple through the Apple Developer program. If a developer distributes their app on the Mac App Store, they have to follow certain guidelines to get approved. These guidelines try to keep malware out of the store. Developers can also add a security certificate to their apps. The certificate is some code inserted into the app code. Users can set their machines to allow third-party apps downloaded from the Internet, but only if they include one of these security certificates.
Find out how to change the settings below so you can install downloaded apps from trusted third-party websites. Don’t install apps from just any site because relaxing security settings could potentially open the door to malware and viruses.
How to Install Apps from Outside the Mac App Store
To install third-party apps, the user must change a setting in the Security & Privacy section of System Preferences, the Settings app in OS X.
Open OS X System Preferences by clicking on the app icon from OS X Dock or by clicking the Apple icon in the Menu Bar in the upper left corner of the screen. When the menu pops up, click on System Preferences.
Click on Security & Privacy from the top row of the System Preferences app. Choose the General tab to see the settings below.
There’s a lock icon at the bottom of the dialog box. Click it to enable all the settings in the box. The OS will ask the user to enter their administrator’s password. Click OK and the grayed out settings become clickable.
The settings we need to work with show up at the bottom half of the dialog box. There are three options under Allow apps downloaded from:. Here are the descriptions taken from Apple’s support site.
- Mac App Store – Only apps that came from the Mac App Store can open.
- Mac App Store and identified developers (default in OS X) – Only allow apps that came from the Mac App Store and developers using Gatekeeper can open.
- Anywhere – Allow applications to run regardless of their source on the Internet (default in OS X Lion v10.7.5); Gatekeeper is effectively turned off. Note: Developer ID-signed apps that have been inappropriately altered will not open, even with this option selected.
If the user chooses the first two options, they can close the dialog box and continue. However, if the user chooses Anywhere, the above warning pops up to scare the user from using this setting. It says:
Choosing “Anywhere” makes your Mac less secure.
The warning box explains that OS X resets this setting after 30 days. Users will have to come back here and do the above steps again. Further, it explains that it’s safer to let the OS warn you each time you launch an app, which includes an option to allow it by clicking an OK button if you select the middle option of the three.
Which Option Should You Choose?
Those who only install apps from the Mac App Store should not bother changing the default settings. Make sure to select the first option labelled Mac App Store and close the box. If you want to install and run any app you want and don’t worry at all about malware, then choose the third option labelled Anywhere. I use the second option since I can still install third-party apps, but they have to come from developers who take the time to add an Apple Developer security certificate to their app. These are safe, but can come from outside the Mac App Store.
Related Posts
While most people can access their email via the web these days, having a dedicated…
We've put together a list of some of the best Mac apps anywhere: if you're looking…
Any time a user installs a new application on a Mac, it becomes the default…
How To Open App Downloaded From Internet Mac
When Apple shipped Mac OS X 10.5, one of the new features was a warning about opening downloaded files (this feature is also present in Mac OS X 10.6). The first time open you such a file, a dialog appears, asking if you’re sure you want to open the file, because it was downloaded from the Internet. The idea behind this feature is a good one—as a user, you should know when you’re launching a program that’s been downloaded, just in case it was somehow downloaded without your knowledge.
In practice, though, this “quarantine” feature can be incredibly annoying, depending on what sorts of files you download. In my case, it’s a real pain because when I often download web-hosted applications, such as Geeklog (which runs macosxhints.com) and phpMyAdmin, a tool for managing MySQL databases.
These downloads can consist of thousands of files, typically a combination of images and text files. The text files are a mix of HTML, PHP (a scripting language), and pure text, but none are actually Mac OS X executable files. The first time I try to open each of those thousands of text files for editing, I see the warning dialog. After about the fifth file, I become very irritated by the warning, and it does more harm than good, as I just blindly click away at it to make it vanish.
How To Allow Applications Downloaded From Anywhere On Mac
There are two solutions to this problem—one removes the warning dialog from already-downloaded files, and the other prevents any future downloads from being flagged with the warning. Note that you do not have to implement both solutions; you can just remove the warning from already-downloaded files while leaving the warning system itself active, if you prefer.
Remove warning from downloaded files
To remove the warning dialog from already-downloaded files, you need to use Terminal (in Applications -> Utilities), and the command itself differs slightly between 10.5 and 10.6. In 10.5, copy and paste this command:
In 10.6, copy and paste this command:
Downloaded Internet Explorer
Note that these commands can take a while to run if there are a lot of files in your Downloads folder. You can also change the directory they run on by modifying the ~/Downloads bit of the command—just change it to reflect the full path to whatever folder you’d like to update. (Remember to use backslashes before spaces, if any of the items on the path contain spaces.)
Application Downloaded From Internet Warning Machinery
I personally use this method alone, while leaving the warning system itself active—I just really don’t need to be warned 1,653 times when I try to open each of the files in the Geeklog distribution.
Permanently disable the warning system
If you’d like to disable the warning dialogs completely (for any files you download in the future), open Terminal and copy and paste this command:
Application Downloaded From Internet Warning Machine
After you get the command prompt back (you won’t see any feedback; the command prompt will simply appear again), restart your Mac. From now on, you won’t be warned when opening downloaded files. It goes without saying, but making this change reduces the security of your machine. As I mentioned earlier, I’ve chosen to leave the warning system in place, and just remove the warning flag from downloaded files when I feel the need.
If you do permanently disable the system, and then decide you’d like it back, repeat the above command, but change NO to YES and reboot your Mac.
I have tested both the one-time and permanent solutionn methods on 10.5 and 10.6, and they work as described (including the bit to turn the warnings back on). Thanks to Jonathan Rentzsch, Ken Aspeslagh, and Timothy Luoma for various pieces of this hint.