Mac – Beta Command Line Tools offered as update—why

betamac-appstoresoftware-updatexcode

Today the App Store is offering me the Command Line Tools for Xcode 10.0 beta 1.

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I do not recall ever signing up as a beta tester for any Apple software. Why do I get this update and how can I prevent such beta software from being accidentally installed on my system?

I have macOS 10.13.5 and Xcode 9.4. I also have MacPorts with clang 6.0 (newer than the one in Xcode, but it shouldn't interfere).

Update 2019-06-04: It is happening again, this time it is offering "Command Line Tools beta 1 for Xcode 11.0". This seems to be a mistake on Apple's part again (see the accepted answer).

Update 2020-09-15: Again with "Command Line Tools beta 5 for Xcode 12.0".

Best Answer

Apple has also now fixed the same issue which occurred with macOS 10.14 Mojave offering CLTools for macOS 10.15 Catalina. For a short time, the 10.14 catalog included 10.15's tools, but this has since been removed from this catalog and only included in the beta catalog.

A removal package has not been provided for removing the 10.15 tools specifically this year. You can try removing the tools using the removal package for 10.14 or removing them completely, then reinstall them:

Apple fixed the issue for macOS 10.13 High Sierra. Refresh the updates with ⌘R and the update should disappear.

This was a bug on Apple's part. Apple has incorrectly released this update to everyone, not just those on a beta upgrade path.

If the update is still shown, you can hide it by right-clicking and choosing Hide Update.

Hide Update from list

If you've installed the update and realised your tools are broken, you can remove these tools using CLTools_macOS_SDK_Remove_1014.pkg from Apple:

The update was incorrectly provided in the default software update catalog on High Sierra: https://swscan.apple.com/content/catalogs/others/index-10.13-10.12-10.11-10.10-10.9-mountainlion-lion-snowleopard-leopard.merged-1.sucatalog.gz.

The update is provided for beta and developers in their associated catalogs:

<dict>
    <key>Digest</key>
    <string>82bddd90f3152da26424d8c6fb7264763a3eee78</string>
    <key>Size</key>
    <integer>26082625</integer>
    <key>MetadataURL</key>
    <string>https://swdist.apple.com/content/downloads/01/53/091-65367/h0b7b20hoylsqj7pih1htv5b9oa9y4z4gq/CLTools_SDK_macOS1014.pkm</string>
    <key>URL</key>
    <string>http://swcdn.apple.com/content/downloads/01/53/091-65367/h0b7b20hoylsqj7pih1htv5b9oa9y4z4gq/CLTools_SDK_macOS1014.pkg</string>
</dict>
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