The install procedure, for something that's supposed to be a security product:
curl -sL https://dl.jitpass.com/jitpass/jit/releases/latest/download/jitpass_darwin_arm64.tar.gz | tar -xz jit
sudo mv jit /usr/local/bin/
that line just pipes a tar archive into tar to extract the binary, not an executable script to a shell. That said, brew install jitpass/tap/jitpass is the recommended way to install.
What is wrong with it?
The pattern of piping an arbitrary script to your shell? This should be an ordinary app bundle to drop into /Applications, or be distributed as an installer.
The readme even says so itself:
> A bad curl | sh, a sketchy npm install, or one of the AI agents now running in your editor with your full permissions.
And then, two paragraphs down, it suggests to do just that to install…
It's not piped to a shell, but to the tar program with specific parameters to directly unpack the tar.
You're still installing the program directly from github of course, instead of a source where hopefully a third party has also looked at it (like a package repository). But this is a lot better than the curl | sh pattern.
You're not downloading from github, but from dl.jitpass.com.
And an executable can do exactly the same as a shell script. The point is that whatever you're executing isn't verified, whether it's a shell script or a binary.
> The point is that whatever you're executing isn't verified, whether it's a shell script or a binary.
The GP said:
> This should be an ordinary app bundle to drop into /Applications
There is no difference between downloading an app bundle that you drop into /Applications, and curling a binary that you put in /usr/local/bin/
The difference is you have the executable for examination (at least a quick virus scan) before you run it. Certanly not perfect, but what is?
You can still do that with their install instructions ;)
That is what I am saying, you are trusting them, but less then `curl | sh`
You’re right. My apologies
Is there McAfee for Mac? There's no real difference. You're trusting someone not to root your shit. Whether it's via curl, dmg, or apt, we have no idea who anybody really is, so it's all on an assumption that people aren't evil. Unfortunately it turns out that there are evil people out there, but doing it via curl | bash or downloading a dmg or though some app store, there's still evil that's gonna get you if you end up trusting in the wrong people.
Well trusting McAfee¹ is one of the choices.
¹ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_McAfee#Legal_issues
But it’s not piping a script into the shell. It’s curl downloading a compressed archive and piping it to tar to decompress the program binary from the archive. Then moving the extracted binary into /usr/local/bin.
Technically this one is piping it to tar? But I agree with the sentiment.
It's curl | tar, not curl | sh
I agree that `curl | tar && mv` is not safer than `curl | sh`.
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