As Apple continues to make the macOS operating system more secure, and IT departments continue to take advantage of additional security features, more and more open-source tools stop working.
Organizational Policies can now be used to prevent users from running any unsigned applications from Finder. While there are work-arounds, often involving the terminal, it is very time consuming to start an application via the command line. Especially if you find yourself reaching for a given tool only once and a while and you need to remind yourself how to open it via the command line.
I encountered such an issue with Meld Merge, my favourite visual diff tool.
Meld is a great tool, you can use it to resolve Git merge conflicts, compare single files, compare entire directories, do three-way comparisons or even just compare copied and pasted text. It is always my go-to for comparing things while programming.
So trying to run Meld.app on my work MacBook pro with a locked down "Allow applications from" setting really started to slow down my workflow.
I discovered that you can actually sign applications yourself to bypass this situation via the Terminal by running the following command:
sudo codesign --force --deep --sign - /Applications/Meld.app