(Note that, for instance, low level hard drive utilities that work with Catalina and beyond have entirely disappeared.)Īs you can imagine, some developers haven't just rolled over and said 'okay, no problem, we'll just go out of business.' Instead they still offer their software, without a certificate from Apple. I haven't seen a list of those rules, but apparently they preclude developers from creating apps that compete with Apple apps in certain ways, and they preclude developers from creating certain types of apps, for instance certain types of utilities or apps that require deep access to the Mac OS. In order for a developer to get a 'certificate' for their app (that is, have it registered so that it doesn't trip the Mac OS's Gatekeeper app, blocking it from being installed), a developer has to follow a number of rules laid down by Apple. There is a lot more to it than just paying $99.

Click to expand.I'm sure that the OpenOffice folks know all about it.