Access to Safari bookmarks from another application
bookmarks, icloud, macos, safari, syncservices
Solution
You can read out the bookmarks plist file even when running in a sandbox if you expressly ask the user for consent: Present an open panel pointing to the plist directory and store the security-scoped bookmark you receive from it. I did this and my app wasn't rejected for this (but for other things).
Problem
I was wondering how we can access Safari bookmarks from another Cocoa application on Mac OS X, in a way that is safe and secure for the future. As you may know, two mechanisms were common to retreive Safari bookmarks: - either read Safari's Bookmarks.plist file - or use the SyncServices API. However, the first is forbidden by sandboxing (mandatory for a distribution through the App Store), and the second has been deprecated since Mac OS X 10.7 Lion. I believe that Apple deprecated SyncServices in favour of iCloud synching, but I can't find any iCloud API that allow access to the bookmarks (1). Any hint on where to look? Native Cocoa is preferred, but any non-deprecated, sandboxing-compatible solution is welcome. Thanks. (1) and, honestly, going through the internet (and thus requiring an internet connexion) to retrieve on a machine something on the same machine seems... awkward — but well, if it was the way to go at least that would be a possibility.