This week I built a sort of munki-pkg replacement app called PKGBuilder. Drag a file or folder and make an Apple package (pkg) installer for the destination you want. I wanted a Mac app version, and the original project required python and that’s not installed by default any more on macOS (though Mac Ports or Homebrew are options if you really want).
Full swift source and Xcode build instructions for PKGBuilder are in my GitHub repo. It was inspired by a discussion in the MacAdmins Slack in the Munki channel. Greg, who started the Munki project, created munki-pkg for making it easy to build package installers from a folder of files. And it does a whole lot more. Maybe one day my app will too.
This PKG builder app of mine was created by me, myself and Codex (me and Claude Code are on a pause at the moment) and the project was informed by prior art, so to speak. The munki-pkg project itself, a nice blog post by ScriptingOSX and a sample shell script by Mager Valp:
- Scripting OS X article Building Simple Component Packages
- Mager Valp’s example script
build-pkg.sh
Yet Another App As A Service (YAAAAAS)
Why make an app? And why should any use it or trust it? At least for me, I make apps because I can. Now with help with AI tools. These random apps that no one uses but me are the same as the random shell script I wrote before. No one knew about them except me. I’m not reinventing the internet, I am building tools for my own use. But it does bring up the new issue trust in the age of vibe coding. Which is slightly different than the Yet another markup language / Yet Another Unix script which has been going on forever. People building something new when perfectly good old things are already there.
Trust in the age of vibe coded apps
There’s a flood of new “vibe coded” Mac apps and all the things being built nowadays. We concern ourselves with Mac apps for this post, but this applies to random web hosted games or services too.
“Vibe coded” sounds like someone with a nice buzz is cheerfully and most whimsically creating things without a care in the world, or at least not much effort. But as someone who is working on a lot of AI-assisted Mac apps, they do take a lot of effort, and sometimes more.
Like the two days I recently spent chasing the wrong way to approach a problem and then finally a pivot or when I fixed some issues on the wrong git branch, followed by git cleanup. Ok, the last part was my fault, but I hadn’t asked for a new feature branch it just made one. That was unexpected, for sure.
Working with AI tools can seem like the pair programmer’s dream, the novice gets a mentor, and problems melt away. Or sometimes they are created and we don’t know it yet. Using documentation before building, while building and reviewing coding decisions, features, issues and fixes yourself can be a way to keep continuity. If you’re now a Mac developer working alone, you need to be organized and careful. And now with the help of multiple AI tools to code review, security audit and sanity check your work there is a great workflow tools for independent coders and builders, like me, to make their own apps.
So far, we have identified a couple of issues even before we get to finished “read to download” Mac apps, building or coding and making decisions with AI help of how to solve problems (let’s try this way) and the mechanics of organizing code, and coding sessions with local git repos, feature branches, and remote hosted GitHub repo. Keeping documentation and iterating with small changes, using pull requests for merging changes from feature branches when testing new ideas will help enormously. When it works it’s a great way to test, iterate, and fix bugs.
Everyone that wants to now can make new tools and add features to solve problems they are having in their existing workflows. My apps are replacing a previously created army of shell scripts. They weren’t bad, but even I was having issues keeping track of all of them, and now my clients, colleagues and friends can use these Mac App versions of the tools much more easily. And now especially me too. No more checking the git repo or random shell scripts, I can check the readme and user guide for the git repo of artisanal slow coded Mac apps.
So this week I built a munki-pkg replacement app PKGBuilder. And next week I’ll have 3-4 other apps built too. Check out code.matx.ca for all my recent workflow apps for Archiware P5, Final Cut Pro and Camera card ingest, backups, folder comparison and file type pie chart fantastic creation. I build what I need when I need it. It’s great. I’m happy.