Many apps can’t do their job without helpers. Some provide services that need to run in the background so that you don’t have to open the app manually whenever they need to run. Others need to perform privileged operations, which require a privileged helper. This article reviews briefly how those currently work, and how they’re changing in Ventura.
There are three different ways that helper apps are normally run: as Login Items, Launch Agents, and Launch Daemons. Although they overlap in how they work and what each does, Apple differentiates them as:
• Launch Daemons are standalone background processes managed by launchd, running as root before the user logs in, and communicating indirectly with user processes, normally by XPC. They’re not allowed to connect to WindowServer.
• Launch Agents are also managed by launchd, but normally run on the user’s behalf, communicating with other processes and daemons. Although they can have GUI interfaces, they’re normally minimal.
• Login Items are usually small apps started when the user logs in, which continue to run until they log out or quit them. These are often used to launch other helpers automatically, but may simply provide convenient access to app features, such as through a menu bar tool.
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