Access Core Data from extension without provisioning profile on macOS?

I'd like to add a Quick Look extension to my program, but in order to be useful, it would have to access the Core Data stack, which seems to require me to add an App Group and a provisioning profile to the project.

Until now, it has been possible for anyone to download the project from Github and compile and run it out of the box. All project targets are set to Team: None and Sign to Run Locally. If I add my provisioning profile to the project, this will no longer work. They will have to create and add their own provisioning profile and change the Signing & Capabilities settings on each of the 26 targets (there seems to be no way to do them all at once). And the profile will have to be renewed every year.

My question is, have I understood this correctly? Is such a major change necessary for what amounts to accessing a file inside the program's own bundle (and another in its Application Support folder.) Is there another way? Is it worth it?
Answered by DTS Engineer in 659947022
Using app groups on macOS does not require a provisioning profile. See this post for more details on this.

Share and Enjoy

Quinn “The Eskimo!” @ Developer Technical Support @ Apple
let myEmail = "eskimo" + "1" + "@apple.com"
Accepted Answer
Using app groups on macOS does not require a provisioning profile. See this post for more details on this.

Share and Enjoy

Quinn “The Eskimo!” @ Developer Technical Support @ Apple
let myEmail = "eskimo" + "1" + "@apple.com"
Thanks for clearing this up! Now let's see if I can make this work.
Nope, this stuff is apparently way over my skill level. Xcode refuses to build my project without a provisioning profile.

Xcode refuses to build my project without a provisioning profile.

Is this a standard Mac app? Or a Mac Catalyst one?

Share and Enjoy

Quinn “The Eskimo!” @ Developer Technical Support @ Apple
let myEmail = "eskimo" + "1" + "@apple.com"
It is a standard Mac app. I finally got it to build again, after removing the App Groups entitlement from all the targets. Now I'll try again to see if I can understand what you're saying in the other post.

EDIT: Yeah, I had missed the team identifier prefix. Now it works. Thanks!

Of course, it still won't build "out of the box", and building it will be non-trivial for anyone without a paid developer account. But I think we can mark the question I ask in the subject line as solved.
Access Core Data from extension without provisioning profile on macOS?
 
 
Q