20 years of Sparkle

[zorgiepoo]

Around yesterday marks Sparkle's 20 year anniversary.

Andy started the project around January 2006 and released a first 0.1 beta then.

To rewind time, you can look at the blog post that introduced Sparkle to the world. There is a video demonstrating it too if you can find it, but it's not really any different than how Sparkle works today 😀.

A lot of things come and go in Mac history, but it's pretty amazing that this module is still so relevant 20 years later.

[andymatuschak]

Gosh. I can't believe some of that kid's code is still running on basically every Mac. I never would have imagined it at the time. Honestly, I'm a bit sheepish about it: it started as a hacked-together weekend project! But, then—so many eventually-serious things do.

I am very grateful to you all for maintaining and stewarding this project all this time. It would have died long ago without you. Thank you.

[tempelmann]

My only successfully paying app I also started 20 years ago. Back then it was a personal quick-n-dirty app made on a weekend to emulate what Apple removed in a OSX upgrade, so I brought it back. I started sharing it - for free - and people started to beg me to pay me something for it. With the opening of the MAS, I made it available for $1 and it was in the Top 1 of Utilities for a day or two, even. 15 years after that, and the app is still raising in sales. And, of course, it uses Sparkle for the non-MAS version. Thank you so much for this, Andy!

[jaywcjlove]

Unbelievable—Sparkle has been maintained for 20 years! I’ve been using it to manage macOS app updates, super stable and easy to integrate. Still amazing after 20 years! 🎉