Developing a Maui Blazor MacCatalyst app for Apple macOS store is a terrible experience

[Jinjinov]

Description

There are many things that could be better.

Developing a MacCatalyst app:

• Building a Release version on Visual Studio for Mac always builds for the first framework in TargetFrameworks, not the selected framework

  • https://developercommunity.visualstudio.com/t/Building-a-Release-version-always-builds/10238279

• Visual Studio for Mac can not run any MAUI project in Release mode:

  • https://developercommunity.visualstudio.com/t/Can-not-run-any-MAUI-project-in-Release-/10237400

• it doesn't work with XCode 14.2 and iOS 16.2

  • The MAUI Blazor doesn't work on iOS 16.2 arm64 simulator #12124 (comment)

• Microsoft.AspNetCore.Components.Web.HeadOutlet throws exception in the trimmed version

  • MissingMethodException occured when deploying Blazor Server app with 'Trim Unused code' aspnetcore#40033 (comment)

• adding signing to csproj results in error MSB6006: "codesign" exited with code 3.

    <EnableCodeSigning>True</EnableCodeSigning>
    <CodesignKey>3rd Party Mac Developer Application: Jinjinov (**********)</CodesignKey>
    <EnablePackageSigning>true</EnablePackageSigning>
    <PackageSigningKey>3rd Party Mac Developer Installer: Jinjinov (**********)</PackageSigningKey>

• can't open developer tools for Blazor:
  • Blazor Hybrid Mac Catalyst Dev Tools not Supported #5561
  • MAUI WebView doesn't allow to web session to inspected in Safari developer tools (Mac Catalyst) #7706

Publishing a MacCatalyst app on Apple macOS store:

• rejected when trying to upload with Transporter: The product archive package's signature is invalid. Ensure that it is signed with your "3rd Party Mac Developer Installer" certificate. A commented section in csproj that the developer could un-comment would be helpful here.

• rejected when trying to upload with Transporter: The product archive is invalid. The Info.plist must contain a LSApplicationCategoryType key, whose value is the UTI for a valid category. For more details, see "Submitting your Mac apps to the App Store". Some indication in Visual Studio would be helpful here. I had to add:

	<key>LSApplicationCategoryType</key>
	<string>public.app-category.productivity</string>

• rejected when trying to upload with Transporter: Invalid bundle. The bundle supports arm64 but not Intel-based Mac computers. Your build must include the x86_64 architecture to support Intel-based Mac computers. A commented section in csproj that the developer could un-comment would be helpful here: <RuntimeIdentifiers>maccatalyst-x64;maccatalyst-arm64</RuntimeIdentifiers>

• rejected when trying to upload with Transporter: Invalid Bundle. The key UIDeviceFamily in the app's Info.plist file contains one or more unsupported values '1'. (ID: e98a0fc1-d792-4b2d-854c-51a5d1649c82) I had to change

	<key>UIDeviceFamily</key>
	<array>
		<integer>1</integer>
		<integer>2</integer>
	</array>

to

	<key>UIDeviceFamily</key>
	<array>
		<integer>2</integer>
	</array>

• rejected when trying to upload with Transporter: App sandbox not enabled. The following executables must include the "com.apple.security.app-sandbox" entitlement with a Boolean value of true in the entitlements property list Adding a Platforms/MacCatalyst/Entitlements.plist file and <CodesignEntitlement>Platforms/MacCatalyst/Entitlements.plist</CodesignEntitlement> inside csproj would be helpful here. I had to add:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
  <dict>
    <key>com.apple.security.app-sandbox</key>
    <true/>
  </dict>
</plist>

• rejected because project name is used instead of application title: Can't set the app name in MacCatalyst project for macOS #12287

• I had to add <key>ITSAppUsesNonExemptEncryption</key><false/> to Info.plist. Some indication in Visual Studio would be helpful here.

• Maui Blazor template lacks entitlements necessary to submit to Apple macOS store

  • Maui Blazor template lacks entitlements necessary to submit to Apple macOS store #13094
  • Update Templates to Make Developing a Maui Blazor MacCatalyst app a Better Experience #14219

• [net6][Catalyst] Testflight published app fails to start with security policy does not allow @ path expansion macios#14686

• [templates] Add comments to help developers  macios#17591

Steps to Reproduce

1. Create a new Maui Blazor project
2. Try to publish a Maui Blazor MacCatalyst app on Apple macOS store

Link to public reproduction project repository

https://github.com/Jinjinov/Ididit

Version with bug

7.0 (current)

Last version that worked well

Unknown/Other

Affected platforms

macOS

Affected platform versions

macOS Ventura 13.1

Did you find any workaround?

No response

Relevant log output

No response

[akhanalcs]

Microsoft should document all the issues and solutions you figured out. And hopefully make the whole experience better.
This was a great post. Thank you!

We've moved this issue to the Backlog milestone. This means that it is not going to be worked on for the coming release. We will reassess the backlog following the current release and consider this item at that time. To learn more about our issue management process and to have better expectation regarding different types of issues you can read our Triage Process.

[rachelkang]

@rolfbjarne thoughts on any of these issues here?