AltStore: An alternative app store for non-jailbroken iOS devices

Re:AltStore: An alternative app store for non-jailbroken iOS... by core-questions on Sunday November 08, 2020 @04:13PM (#25029103)

The only downside here is that you have to have a Mac (or some hackintosh, I guess) to do this. Anyone have any idea on the state of the art for running an OSX virtual machine?

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Re:AltStore: An alternative app store for non-jailbroken iOS... by phoe-krk on Sunday November 08, 2020 @04:14PM (#25029111)

https://github.com/myspaghetti/macos-virtualbox

Pretty bulletproof and automated.

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Re:AltStore: An alternative app store for non-jailbroken iOS... by Shank on Sunday November 08, 2020 @05:49PM (#25029832)

This script seems to include the magic encryption string[0]. I'm surprised that it hasn't been DMCA'd yet.

[0]: https://github.com/myspaghetti/macos-virtualbox/blob/master/...

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Re:AltStore: An alternative app store for non-jailbroken iOS... by phoe-krk on Sunday November 08, 2020 @05:53PM (#25029860)

The magic "ourhardworkbythesewordsguardedpleasedontsteal(c)AppleComputerInc" haiku-string is already kind of a meme by now.

See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9589961

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Re:AltStore: An alternative app store for non-jailbroken iOS... by saagarjha on Monday November 09, 2020 @06:22AM (#25033610)

Another cute poem: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8579272

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Re:AltStore: An alternative app store for non-jailbroken iOS... by josephcsible on Sunday November 08, 2020 @06:37PM (#25030117)

Are they going to DMCA a federal judge's order too? https://www.rcfp.org/wp-content/uploads/imported/20120105_20...

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Re:AltStore: An alternative app store for non-jailbroken iOS... by Tepix on Monday November 09, 2020 @08:32AM (#25034582)

Thanks. The page mentions transfering the image to QEMU + KVM with hardware passthrough for good performance. Is there a script or guide on how to set that up?

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Re:AltStore: An alternative app store for non-jailbroken iOS... by phoe-krk on Monday November 09, 2020 @08:41AM (#25034679)

I have no idea how to do that and I have never attempted this myself.

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Re:AltStore: An alternative app store for non-jailbroken iOS... by saurik on Sunday November 08, 2020 @04:31PM (#25029262)

AltStore also supports Windows AFAIK. https://altstore.io/

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Re:AltStore: An alternative app store for non-jailbroken iOS... by kevincox on Sunday November 08, 2020 @05:12PM (#25029594)

If it works on windows why does it need the server at all? If it is just making requests to Apple can't you do the signing on the phone? (Other than the bootstrap procedure)

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Re:AltStore: An alternative app store for non-jailbroken iOS... by saurik on Sunday November 08, 2020 @05:17PM (#25029632)

You can do the signing on the phone (though there is some nuance here as logging in to the account is hard and the techniques used by AltStore involve injection into other Apple software; this is at least theoretically fixable, but does mean that it wouldn't be trivial), but you can't do the installation from another app on the phone in any obvious way (at least without restricted entitlements). AltStore is acting like Xcode doing over-the-network installs from AltServer (and then also happens to do the signing there, but that's again simply to make it easier to develop it).

AltStore is based on the signing code I developed and also used in my Cydia Impactor (which lets you install apps over USB); I actually did develop another tool called Cydia Extender, which would run on your phone, but I dropped the effort when I couldn't get stuff to install on the phone (the technique I came up with relied on an entitlement that was only able to be installed by users with developer accounts; I even somehow failed to notice this until after I released it, which was awkward: I still can't believe I messed up my testing that badly). (Actually... maybe I have a way to pull this off now? It is a long shot, and somewhat risky ;P.)

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Re:AltStore: An alternative app store for non-jailbroken iOS... by mikeknoop on Sunday November 08, 2020 @05:24PM (#25029690)

Could you use a VPN on the device to make a remote server appear as a local server for network installs? If so, could you loop back an on device “server” through a remote proxy?

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Re:AltStore: An alternative app store for non-jailbroken iOS... by saurik on Sunday November 08, 2020 @05:29PM (#25029716)

So, this is actually how Cydia Extender "worked" (aka, "failed" ;P)--though I wasn't using the Xcode protocol but instead did an ad hoc install (which turned out to also separately not work for non-developer signed IPA files, TWO issues I had failed to notice before release ;P)--but Apple restricts usage of the Network Extension (VPN) API using an entitlement only available to paid developers (which I will strongly assert is to help the CCP's censorship of Chinese citizens as part of Apple's continual unfortunate collaboration). (I now happen to work on semi-programmable VPN tech that is in the App Store, so I might have options; a bit risky, though ;P.)

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Re:AltStore: An alternative app store for non-jailbroken iOS... by vvll on Sunday November 08, 2020 @05:19PM (#25029646)

AltDaemon [1] runs on the phone and does this - it does require a jailbreak however.

[1] https://repo.dynastic.co/package/altdaemon

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Re:AltStore: An alternative app store for non-jailbroken iOS... by djxfade on Sunday November 08, 2020 @05:08PM (#25029568)

No, AltStore has a server for Windows as well

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Re:AltStore: An alternative app store for non-jailbroken iOS... by runjake on Sunday November 08, 2020 @06:15PM (#25029996)

You don’t need a Mac. It works on Windows too.

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Re:AltStore: An alternative app store for non-jailbroken iOS... by srtjstjsj on Sunday November 08, 2020 @08:56PM (#25030721)

There's a beta windows version.

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