I'd say VSCode is a bit different in who it's aimed at. Only because it doesn't work for a consumer product doesn't mean this wouldn't work for VSCode.

Also it might be good to be more specific. E.g. don't ask for all permissions at once, instead if the app starts talking to telemetry.endpoint.com it has to ask for these specific permissions at that point.

Then the user can see, hey this is requesting access to this particular server, that seems fishy, let's not proceed.

Are VSCode users really that much more diligent? Are you auditing the source code for every extension you install? Do you even know if the github source is the same as whats hosted on the plugins repo?

The only real solution I can see is only installing plugins from large trusted entities.

For sketch extensions, download the vsix from the marketplace and extract it (it’s just a zip), then inspect that and load it.

> android tried this initially with the permissions system. But literally every app requested every permission and it became completely useless.

Google could have fixed this by allowing the user to give the app mock permissions instead, e.g. empty or randomly-generated storage, fake camera device, randomly-generated contact list, etc. Third-party solutions that allow this have been around for about a decade, but they do not have the reach that Google does.

Users here are experienced developers, so I think it's not such a big deal. In context, a theme should never need network or file storage access, so you could upfront block those for that type of extension. You can also have policies like "network access is okay but file system and network access together needs approval".

Why are you assuming most VSCode users are "experienced developers"? I would think quite the contrary, as the younger crowd is probably much more likely to be using it than more experienced developers.

Fair enough. I think we can agree that the average VS code developer is more technically savvy than the average Android user?

I find I very quickly tire of having to think about this. You think "A theme shouldn't require file storage access" and then spend an hour looking up why it does and find out there is actually some strange but totally legitimate reason for it. And every time that happens, you lose a little bit of will to care about what permissions something requested.

There used to be a period where many android apps would explain in the description why they needed certain permissions. Those days are over.

> You think "A theme shouldn't require file storage access" and then spend an hour looking up why it does and find out there is actually some strange but totally legitimate reason for it

No. You think it is suspicious and install another theme that doesn't request anything.

A counter-example where a permissions system mostly still works is Mac apps. They also have to request permissions for things like using the webcam, accessing important areas of the filesystem, reading keyboard input when they’re not the active program, and so on.

It might be illustrative that Apple, who usually care a lot about good UX, made this procedure downright painful. When the app is installed it’s fine, but when it tries to use a permissioned resource for the first time that pops up a dialog box. That box is not confirm/deny, but rather sends you to the System Settings window, where you have to find the right category, find the program in that category, select Allow, and then enter your password. It seems like Apple might think the Android permissions system failed in part because they made it too easy to say yes.

I regularly deny various permissions to various Android apps (camera permission, file access, ...) and they degrade gracefully and keep on working.

If there was a permission dialog with boxes I would gladly check or uncheck them because nowadays I need to write bash scripts, create separate users or build containers for every third-party app. Why doesn't OS include necessary tools?

> But literally every app requested every permission

They didn't. Google regrouped and renamed the permissions until every normal thing that every application needed became grouped with rare and powerful capabilities.

Except for the ad-based crapware, almost all applications minimize their permissions.

Android used to ask for all permissions upfront, you have no choice. You want the app? Too bad, it is gets access to your contacts. Now apps have to ask when they need them and they are working on making file permissions more granular as well