Apple Removes iPhone Vibe Coding App from App Store
41 points
2 hours ago
| 7 comments
| gizmodo.com
| HN
barbazoo
25 minutes ago
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It's refreshing that projects like https://grapheneos.org/ exist that let you take control of your device again at least to some degree.
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peddling-brink
2 hours ago
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As I understand it, these apps allowed running custom code from the app, and that has always been disallowed.
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victorbjorklund
11 minutes ago
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Not entirely. There is scriptable which allows you to run custom JS
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vmg12
1 hour ago
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Other than exceptions like Roblox
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echoangle
59 minutes ago
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Maybe disallowed but definitely not enforced. There’s an app called Pythonista that has allowed you to run arbitrary python code for years.
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trillic
51 minutes ago
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I haven't been in the App Store ecosystem in a while, but the restriction is generally on running new Machine Code, all machine code needs to be signed on iOS. Interpreters get around this limitation, only the interpreter code that is compiled AoT and signed is actually running.

This tracks as the reasoning behind a lack of other browser engines, nobody can get comparable performance without a JIT, which would be compiling net new machine code that wasn't shipped with the binary.

The best way to handle this I would imagine within the current bounds of Apple's restrictions would be WASM.

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wat10000
12 minutes ago
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Apps don't get removed for breaking that rule, though, because they can't break it in the first place. The system won't allow you to mark a freshly written page as executable.
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_moof
21 minutes ago
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Years ago I watched a bunch of people stop an apartment building from being built. They did this by employing a legal concern that they didn't actually care about, but that they knew would stop the development in its tracks. It worked.

That was the day I realized that for a lot of people, rules aren't actually rules. They're tools that they can use to stop something they don't like, no matter what the rule is really about.

I think this is a disgusting attitude, but it's unfortunately the way a lot of people operate.

So it might be that Apple has this "no external code" rule to stop things they don't like, and the category of "things Apple doesn't like" doesn't actually include every app that runs external code. It includes a lot of them, but for whatever reason Apple chose not to codify the details. Crummy if true, but I wouldn't be surprised. Every regulator I've ever dealt with leaves themselves an "I know it when I see it" escape hatch that lets them ban whatever they want.

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TSUTiger
1 hour ago
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there are terminal type apps in the app store though?
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circuit10
57 minutes ago
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nozzlegear
48 minutes ago
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Those are terminal emulators, not actual terminals. You can't fork or exec on iOS/iPadOS, so they're not actually running e.g. a python process, they're just running python interpreter.
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Asmod4n
27 minutes ago
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ish runs a full blown x86 alpine linux distro.
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ramesh31
2 hours ago
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>"and that has always been disallowed".

And it's always been a stupid rule. If I ship an app with a browser view, I can run any custom code I want in it. The rule is just a bandaid on Apple's lack of true sandboxing for apps.

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wvenable
1 hour ago
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> The rule is just a bandaid on Apple's lack of true sandboxing for apps.

That's not it at all. If an app can run arbitrary code then it can run other apps and that can by-pass the app store. They are specifically trying to prevent something like Wechat on the iPhone. It's not about security, it's about money and control.

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greyface-
34 minutes ago
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If we had to live with this rule during the "classic" Mac era, it would have disallowed HyperCard.
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mciancia
1 hour ago
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Wechat works on iPhone
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wat10000
11 minutes ago
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What's lacking in the sandboxing?
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sheept
1 hour ago
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That's because browsers are the most battle tested sandbox out there. It's not worth developing another sandbox if they already have Safari webview.
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Jyaif
1 hour ago
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> browsers are the most battle tested sandbox out there

The most battle tested sandbox... after operating system. After all, browsers rely on the OS to provide the primitives for their sandboxes.

And curiously those primitives are not exposed by iOS.

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mentalgear
43 minutes ago
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Apple's huge problem here is - even though the get 50% more native app submissions this year - that these apps-in-apps (no matter how buggy they are) do not get them their predatory 30% Apple cut.

That being said, it is rumoured that Apple will make deal with the big one like Replit as long as these apps do not run on ios - they are going to keep profiting off that walled garden until it collapses.

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matthewkayin
35 minutes ago
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Know the workplace rules!

Steam: We take a 30% cut of profits on our store. Devs: Aww you're so sweet.

Apple: We take a 30% cut of profits on our store. Devs: Hello? Human resources?

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wbobeirne
31 minutes ago
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I cannot get apps on my iPhone from anywhere else but the App Store. While they are dominant, Valve isn't locking anyone in even on their own hardware.
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_aavaa_
26 minutes ago
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This get brought up often, and it’s such a lazy example. Apple forces you to give them their cut (you have to pay for developer license even just to keep your own personal apps on your phone).

Valve isn’t forcing you to use Steam.

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AlotOfReading
21 minutes ago
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Valve's most anticompetitive rule is that steam keys you distribute outside steam not be sold for less than the price on steam. Would that Apple were the same.
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vorpalhex
31 minutes ago
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Steam doesn't prevent me from running other games on my pc.
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k310
21 minutes ago
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IANAL, but I think it means creating apps that stand alone outside their creator. I have a couple of linux VM's a-shell and iSH, but nothing runs outside of them.
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cadamsdotcom
2 hours ago
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It’ll be interesting to see if Apple comes around on customization of apps in general, because hopefully that’ll soon be what users expect.

In the world where users expect to be able to customize software more and more, apps start to look quite rigid and open platforms like the web that offer flexibility start to look more appealing.

Imagine a Lovable-style PWA that morphs into the app you vibecoded by storing the generated code in localStorage, for example - with cloud fallbacks to re-download the code if the storage is wiped.

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namanyayg
1 hour ago
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That's funny to read this today morning because that's exactly what i've been working on.

We helped a Series B YC company with a whitelabel Lovable app so all of their customers can build exactly what they need on top of their SaaS!

It really works -- 1200 customers are now vibe coding daily and using their SaaS a LOT more.

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lostlogin
54 minutes ago
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> open platforms like the web

I winced. The threats to the open web at the moment are depressing.

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ddlsmurf
51 minutes ago
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Linux and Windows have always been a lot more customisable, Apple always was the more "we know better than you what you want" company... And they weren't wrong enough
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sheept
1 hour ago
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It could probably store the code in the Cache API and serve it from a service worker so that it works offline and doesn't require evaling JavaScript
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legitronics
1 hour ago
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What does vibe coding add here? How is this any different than just arbitrary code execution on device, which is exactly what this gatekeeper rule covers?

(Not commenting on the rule, just want to see what’s new here)

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wvenable
1 hour ago
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The only thing it changes is the audience. Developers are an insanely small subset of iPhone users but these applications are targeting everyone else.
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_alternator_
2 hours ago
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The real problem for Apple here: in the fairly near future, the model of pre-defined functionality of software will be obsolete. All apps will be vibe coded and customized. Individual apps will basically be silos that protect proprietary data sources that are difficult to collect. But they will be infinitely more configurable than they are today.
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WarmWash
2 hours ago
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I suspect any minute the first software with integrated AI customization will launch. Geeks will hate it, but regular folks will love trading all those god damn endless settings and menus for a simple prompt bar.

In an almost ironic twist, GUI will revert back to a "CLI".

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WillAdams
1 hour ago
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Yeah, I've been wondering what this might look like for a 3D printer slicer --- heck, I'd be glad to just have a series of sliders:

- aesthetic print quality

- dimensional accuracy

- strength

- ease of removing supports

- reliability of printing

which resolve to two values which estimate:

- print time

- volume of material used/consumed in supports

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wolvoleo
1 hour ago
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Yeah but not everyone has the same priorities within those sliders. For example strength is something that has many different types. Tensile strength, compression strength, shearing etc.

You use different infills to optimise for each type. This differs per model. An AI can surely help optimise it but it won't always know which one to prioritize, it requires knowing exactly what the printed model will be used for.

The same with aesthetics, usually you care about one specific side. And for ease of remove, are you willing to use support interface material? That makes a lot of difference.

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ToucanLoucan
58 minutes ago
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Is there an actual use-case for this fan-fiction-esque prediction of software that rewrites itself, or is this just promoting AI for the sake of promoting it only?

I get annoyed enough when software I use changes arbitrarily in ways that don't benefit me, I can't see LLM vibed software that changes itself based on what it thinks I need being an improvement at all. It just feels like it would be even more annoying.

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qubidt
52 minutes ago
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My ideal software: buggy in ways you can't diagnose, for reasons you can't intuit, reproducible by literally no one in the world, and with no one to file a bug report to
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ToucanLoucan
48 minutes ago
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I love the idea of all software everywhere involving a die roll. Sounds like it'll be even more infuriating than most computing is right now.
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