Tweaky: not coming to a Mac App Store near you anytime soon

A little over a month ago, I wanted to see what Apple would do if I submitted Tweaky to the Mac App Store. Not surprisingly, after keeping it waiting for review for about a month, Apple rejected it.

Tweaky is my little Mac app that lets you enable the so-called "Super Secret preferences" in Twitter for Mac that are otherwise only available to people who purchased Tweetie for Mac via the MacHeist bundle (or who are comfortable with setting preferences manually via Terminal). You can download it via my web site but you won't be seeing it on the Mac App Store anytime soon.

The reasons? Twofold.

Firstly, it apparently "provides a limited set of features and functionality to users" and thus does not comply with section 2.8 in the App Store Review Guidelines which states:

2.8 Apps that are not very useful or do not provide any lasting entertainment value may be rejected

So, basically, Apple thinks that Tweaky is not useful. The 3,000 or so people who downloaded it off my blog based simply on my tweets probably disagree. But that's beside the point. It's Apple's playground and they can choose who they want to allow in. I'm cool with that. As long as there are still other ways of getting software onto your Mac, that is.

The second reason? The application "is creating files in the incorrect directories." This apparently violates section 2.30 of the App Store Review Guidelines, which states:

2.30 Apps that do not comply with the Mac OS X File System documentation will be rejected

So how was I violating the Mac OS X File System documentation?

The application is creating files or writing to <~/Library/…com.twitter.twitter-mac.plist>

In other words, by changing Twitter for Mac's preferences. Unfortunately, that is what Tweaky does! :)

The funny thing, of course, is that by allowing people full access to Twitter for Mac's features, Tweaky actually makes Twitter for Mac compliant with Apple's App Store policies (Twitter for Mac currently isn't in compliance since it has hidden features that are only available to a subset of users and unlocked via external means.)

Oh well, I never really expected them to approve it but I would have been positively surprised if they had.

Ultimately, though, I do hope that there will never come a time when the only way to install apps on your Mac is via the App Store. If that ever happens – as painful as it may be – I will switch to Linux.

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