NAME

pkgbuild — Build a macOS Installer component package from on-disk files

SYNOPSIS

DESCRIPTION

A “component package” contains payload to be installed by the macOS Installer. Although a component package can be installed on its own, it is typically incorporated into a product archive, along with a “distribution” and localized resources, using productbuild(1).

To create a product archive for submission to the Mac App Store, do not use pkgbuild. Instead, use productbuild(1) directly.

pkgbuild has three different modes, as shown in the SYNOPSIS above:

1. Package a complete destination root. When you use xcodebuild(1) with the install action, the result is a destination root, either under /tmp, or in whatever location you specify with the Xcode DSTROOT setting. Use the --root option to specify that destination root directory to pkgbuild, and the entire contents of the directory tree will be included in the output package.
2. Create a template component property list (analyze mode). You point pkgbuild to a destination root as above, but instead of outputting a package, pkgbuild outputs a component property list (see COMPONENT PROPERTY LIST). By editing this property list and specifying it with --component-plist when you subsequently build the package, you can control bundle-specific Installer behavior.
3. Package one or more individual bundles. If you don't have a destination root, you can use the --component option to specify one or more bundles that should be incorporated into the package. Note that only bundles can be specified with --component.

ARGUMENTS AND OPTIONS

--root root-path

Package the entire contents of the directory tree at root-path, typically a destination root created by xcodebuild(1).

--component component-path

The bundle at component-path is added to the package. Valid only if you don't use --root.

--component-plist plist-path

If you specify --root, you can use --component-plist to identity the bundles within that destination root, and control how the macOS Installer handles those bundles. See more at COMPONENT PROPERTY LIST. If you add bundles and need to update your component property list, you can specify the old version with --component-plist when running pkgbuild with --analyze, and the old settings will be propagated to the output for still-extant bundles.

--scripts scripts-path

Archive the entire contents of scripts-path as the package scripts. If this directory contains scripts named preinstall and/or postinstall, these will be ran as the top-level scripts of the package. If you want to run scripts for specific bundles, you must specify those in a component property list; see more at COMPONENT PROPERTY LIST. Any other files under scripts-path will be used only if the top-level or component-specific scripts invoke them. If the script needs to run for longer than 10 minutes, it should be added as a component-specific script with the BundleInstallScriptTimeout component key added.

--nopayload

Indicates that the package will contain only scripts, with no payload.

--identifier pkg-identifier

Specify a unique identifier for this package. The macOS Installer recognizes a package as being an upgrade to an already-installed package only if the package identifiers match, so it is advisable to set a meaningful, consistent identifier when you build the package. pkgbuild will infer an identifier when building a package from a single component, but will fail otherwise if the identifier has not been set.

--version pkg-version

Specify a version for the package. Packages with the same identifier are compared using this version, to determine if the package is an upgrade or downgrade. If you don't specify a version, a default of zero is assumed, but this may prevent proper upgrade/downgrade checking.

--install-location install-path

Specify the default install location for the contents of the package. For example, if you specify a single application component, you might specify an install-path of /Applications. pkgbuild attempts to infer a sensible install path if this option is not used, but it may not choose correctly. Note that whether or not the default install location is actually used by the macOS Installer depends on the distribution file you deploy with the package.

--analyze

Instead of creating a package, create a template component property list from the destination root given with --root. See COMPONENT PROPERTY LIST.

--prior pkg-path

In addition to the options above, you can also set the package identifier, version and install location by pointing to a prior version of the same package. pkgbuild will read the package at pkg-path and use the same package identifier and install location contained therein. The version number in the prior package will be converted to an integer and incremented, and the result used for the new package. Note that pkgbuild makes no attempt to verify that the prior package is in any way equivalent to the one being built, so you must make sure you point it to a logically equivalent package.

--filter filter-expression

By default, --root will include the entire contents of the given root-path in the package payload, except for any .svn or CVS directories, and any .DS_Store files. You can override these default filters by specifying one or more --filter options. Each filter-expression is an re_format(7) “extended” expression: any path in the root which matches any of the given expressions will be excluded from the package payload. (Note that specifying even one --filter inhibits the default filters, so you must respecify the default filters if you still want them to be used.)

--ownership (recommended | preserve | preserve-other)

By default, when the payload is archived into the package, the recommended UID and GID will be applied to all files. (Generally, this will be root:wheel, which ensures that files installed in the system domain are root-owned, while files installed in the user home directory will be owned by that user.) If you have special ownership requirements, you should use chmod(1) to adjust the ownership of the source files, and use --ownership preserve so that pkgbuild archives the exact ownership of the on-disk files. Alternatively, if you have just a few files to adjust, --ownership preserve-other will apply the recommended UID and GID to those files that are owned by the user running pkgbuild, but leave other files unchanged. Note that pkgbuild never changes the ownership of the actual on-disk files, only the ownership that is archived into the package.

--large-payload

By default, packages that are created have a per-file size limit associated with them. This method instructs pkgbuild to construct a package where the included payload format supports large files. A large file is defined as any file that is 8 GiB or larger.

Warning: The --large-payload option generates packages that are only compatible with macOS Monterey (12.0) and above. Packages using this feature will fail to install or extract on previous releases. Specifying this option requires the user to pass [--min-os-version 12.0] or later to acknowledge this requirement.

--compression compression-mode

Allows control over the compression used for the package. This option does not affect the compression used for plugins or scripts. Not specifying this option will leave the chosen compression algorithm up to the operating system. Two compression-mode arguments are supported:

• legacy forces a 10.5-compatible compression algorithm for the package.
• latest enables pkgbuild to automatically select newer, more efficient compression algorithms based on what is provided to [--min-os-version <version>].

--min-os-version os-version

Specifying a minimum OS version allows the system to create a package with the latest supported features. Some features can have major benefits such as a better compression ratio. However, specifying a minimum version will make the package require that version when presented to productbuild(1). Some of the options in this tool require this argument to be provided.

--sign identity-name

Adds a digital signature to the resulting package. See SIGNED PACKAGES

--keychain keychain-path

Specify a specific keychain to search for the signing identity. See SIGNED PACKAGES

--cert certificate-name

Specify an intermediate certificate to be embedded in the package. See SIGNED_PACKAGES

--timestamp

Include a trusted timestamp with the signature. See SIGNED_PACKAGES

--timestamp=none

Disable trusted timestamp, regardless of identity. See SIGNED_PACKAGES

--quiet

Inhibits status messages on stdout. Any error messages are still sent to stderr.

package-output-path

The path to which the package will be written.

plist-output-path

When --analyze is used, the path to which the template component property list will be written.

COMPONENT PROPERTY LIST

When you package a destination root, you can use a component property list to specify how bundles in that root should be handled by the macOS Installer. This property list should be an array of dictionaries, where each dictionary specifies a single bundle. The dictionary keys are as follows:

The easiest way to create a component property list is to use the --analyze option and point pkgbuild at your current destination root. The output will be a component property list with default attributes, which you can then edit as needed. You can also specify a previous version of your component property list when using --analyze, which will cause the attributes of previously existing bundles to be propagated forward.

BundleOverwriteAction specifies how an existing version of the bundle on disk should be handled if the version in the package is installed. Despite the name, both upgrade and update do no version checking. Conditionally installing based on version is controlled entirely by BundleIsVersionChecked. If you specify upgrade, the bundle in the package atomically replaces any version on disk; this has the effect of deleting old paths that no longer exist in the new version of the bundle. If you specify update, the bundle in the package overwrites the version on disk, and any files not contained in the package will be left intact; this is appropriate when you are delivering an update-only package. Another effect of update is that the package bundle will not be installed at all if there is not already a version on disk; this allows a package to deliver an update for an app that the user might have deleted.

BundlePreInstallScriptPath and BundlePostInstallScriptPath are meaningful only if --scripts was used to specify a scripts directory. The paths given by these keys must be relative to the scripts directory.

BundleInstallScriptTimeout defines how long the script is able to run before the operating system terminates it with SIGKILL. If this key is not specified, the operating system default timeout is chosen, which is currently 10 minutes but is also subject to change. This key is only respected on versions of macOS newer than macOS 15.0.

ChildBundles can be used to represent nesting of bundles, but it does not change the meaning of RootRelativeBundlePath within lower-level dictionaries (i.e. it is always relative to the destination root). If you write a component property list manually, you do not need to use ChildBundles at all; you can simply put all bundle dictionaries in the top-level array.

SIGNED PACKAGES

When creating a package, you can optionally add a digital signature to the package. You will need to have a certificate and corresponding private key -- together called an “identity” -- in one of your accessible keychains. To add a signature, specify the name of the identity using the --sign option. The identity's name is the same as the “Common Name” of the certificate.

If you want to search for the identity in a specific keychain, specify the path to the keychain file using the --keychain option. Otherwise, the default keychain search path is used.

pkgbuild will embed the signing certificate in the product archive, as well as any intermediate certificates that are found in the keychain. If you need to embed additional certificates to form a chain of trust between the signing certificate and a trusted root certificate on the system, use the --cert option to give the Common Name of the intermediate certificate. Multiple --cert options may be used to embed multiple intermediate certificates.

The signature can optionally include a trusted timestamp. This is enabled by default when signing with a Developer ID identity, but it can be enabled explicitly using the --timestamp option. A timestamp server must be contacted to embed a trusted timestamp. If you aren't connected to the Internet, you can use --timestamp=none to disable timestamps, even for a Developer ID identity.

Note that if you are going to create a signed product with the resulting package, using productbuild(1), there is no reason to sign the individual package.

EXAMPLES

pkgbuild --identifier com.sample.pkg.app --root /tmp/Sample.dst Sample.pkg

Build the package Sample.pkg using the entire contents of the destination root /tmp/Sample.dst.

pkgbuild --analyze --root /tmp/Sample.dst components.plist

Analyze the destination root /tmp/Sample.dst, and write a template component property list to components.plist.

pkgbuild --identifier com.sample.pkg.app --root /tmp/Sample.dst --component-plist components-edited.plist Sample.pkg

Build the package Sample.pkg using the destination root /tmp/Sample.dst, using the bundle-specific behaviors indicated in components-edited.plist.

pkgbuild --identifier com.sample.pkg.app --root /tmp/Sample.dst --sign sample-identity Sample.pkg

Build the package Sample.pkg using the destination root /tmp/Sample.dst, and sign the resulting package using the identity sample-identity. You will be prompted to allow pkgbuild to access the keychain item, unless Always Allow was chosen previously.

SEE ALSO

productbuild(1), xcodebuild(1)