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macOS Sierra and Later Not Listed in Mac App Store Purchased Tab, Updates Not Tied to Apple ID

Hi,

I was very overdue to upgrade my OS. I have been holding out because of some older software that I didn't want to risk not working properly after the upgrade. After much research and developing a plan B if it all failed, I finally decided to bite the bullet and upgrade my MBP today and to my dismay, realized that I could not access Sierra in the App Store.

It has taken me a long time to get up the nerve to upgrade to Sierra, and I am definitely not ready to attempt an upgrade to High Sierra. I feel so fortunate that I found this discussion!

I really don't think that I could have managed this upgrade using the other method presented earlier in the discussion. I took a look at some of those directions and thought I might need a drink (kidding). I am so relieved that I was able to obtain and successfully upgrade to Sierra today without much fuss.

I signed up to this forum just to post A BIG THANK YOU to the person that provided the link in post 155 and also to the other participants in this discussion who vetted this solution and have tried to advocate to Apple for reasonable solutions. I am sure that there are other "not so power-users" that will benefit from this discussion.
 
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It shouldn't be so hard.

Yesterday I had to do a clean install of El Capitan on one of my macs. I did so using one of my many bootable usbs quite easily.

I have such bootable usbs for every point release for every mac os from 10.7 to 10.13 as well as some for pre-release betas for those too and also some for snow leopard, leopard and tiger.

So I have a vast resource of such usbs in a box. The box of usbs gives me a great choice of systems for my macs. Far greater than anything currently offered by apple. Yet evidently they still have all these installers secretly residing on their servers (but maybe not the tiger ones). They just restrict access to these older versions.

So the truth is that theoretically I could get rid of my box of usbs and rely on apple's servers to get any point release of any system from 10.7 to 10.13. If only they would let me! And of course they won't. Hence the box of usbs. I think that is pretty ridiculous.

I've got another box full of floppys, cds, dvds, for systems 1 to 10.6.

There is the issue of expired certificates, but that is easily circumvented by changing the date with terminal.

Even though the usefulness of systems 1 to 10.6 are less relevant for more modern machines it is nevertheless somewhat perverse to say that these NEVER EXPIRE!. You can ALWAYS install these on machines that support them!

We need to remind apple of that fact because they seem to have forgotten it for more recent systems.

I want to be able to easily select ANY POINT RELEASE of ANY SYSTEM my machines support and EASILY install ANY of them.

And I don't really want to have to do that by digging into my box of usbs. I want to be able to do it easily from either the mac app store, or apple's website.

But alas no. Apple will force me to go digging into my box of usbs. PATHETIC APPLE!

Well as of yesterday I now have a clean install of El Capitan. Despite apple.

I think it is just a marketing thing to force everyone onto High Sierra. Clearly not everyone wants that. So it's time to declare war on apple's marketing team.
 
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I also used the link in Post #155 to successfully install Sierra. I installed it on a MacBook Pro (13-inch, Mid 2012). In "System Preferences > Security & Privacy > General > Allow apps downloaded from", I did have to select "Anywhere" before it would install, though.

Everything seems to be working OK. Thanks, folks, especially to Mr_Brightside_@, jimthing, and Bob-K.

I was a little nervous about not downloading it directly from the Mac App Store, so I did make an attempt to verify it using the procedures I found here in an article entitled "Verifying that you’ve downloaded genuine Apple software."

The first part all checked out regarding the checks on the installer's digital signature, but when I went to verify that the signature isn’t broken, I got the result that the "resource envelope is obsolete (custom omit rules)". Not sure what that means. Any ideas? Is this cause for concern?

I also verified that the SHA1 checksum for the installer (InstallESD.dmg) matched the value listed here.

I had intended to check the download using the procedure here, but for some reason the installer was an .app instead of a .pkg. When I double-clicked the installer, it just started the installation instead of opening an installer window.

Finally, I see that the link in question keeps getting deleted from the original thread that was linked to in Post #155 for some reason...
 
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About 9 hours ago, i'm getting the below warning.

$ mas install 1127487414

Warning: Install macOS Sierra is already installed

#####

Now, I'm getting a pop-up 'Redownload Unavailable with This Apple ID'

I'm pretty sure Apple just blocked downloading MacOS 10.12.6 via mas :( (all installers since Mavericks is tied to my Apple ID)
 
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ma5te12m1nd said:
About 9 hours ago, i'm getting the below warning.

$ mas install 1127487414

Warning: Install macOS Sierra is already installed

#####

Now, I'm getting a pop-up 'Redownload Unavailable with This Apple ID'

I'm pretty sure Apple just blocked downloading MacOS 10.12.6 via mas :( (all installers since Mavericks is tied to my Apple ID)
Click to expand...
Did you download Sierra before? If not, that command-line tool will not work. Hence the error message.
 
Hope this helped a few people. Any idea if that command line tool works with Mavericks, given it was free? It is NOT associated with my Apple ID.

EDIT not possible
[doublepost=1506969206][/doublepost]I currently cannot see Mountain Lion listed, which was previously linked to my ID. Anyone else experiencing this?
 
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So, the command-line trick officially no longer works? I'd reeeeeeally like to have a 10.12 installer on hand in case crap hits the fan...
 
Avid Media Composer 8.9 is not compatible with High Sierra yet, so not finding Sierra on the App Store was bad news... Thank you so much jasminetroll, 'mas install 1127487414' saved my day.

It wasn't working with my main Apple ID with which I downloaded Sierra a while ago but it worked with a client's ID with which I recently downloaded Sierra.

Sierra was not showing in the App Store but to my surprise 'mas install 1127487414' triggered the download!
 
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JamesPDX said:
FWIW, the size of the USB thumb drive needs to be bigger than the one that was big enough for the release a year ago. Just buy a few 16BG Sandisk or Lexar USB sticks and they should work as installers.

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201372

https://lifehacker.com/how-to-make-a-bootable-macos-sierra-usb-flash-drive-1786853248

etc, etc. Just mind the name you give to your formatted USB drive.
Click to expand...
With all due respect, if you actually read the thread, we all know how to make a sodding bootable backup, that's the easy part. That's not the issue of the thread.

The issue here is Sierra itself is now NOT available from the MAS (unless you use underground tools to get it, and ONLY if you previously downloaded it pre-High Sierra release), with Apple failing to provide users any way to do so now, nor even supplying a support article with a hidden link to the MAS for it (as they did with El Capitan, last year), nor a support article explaining what the hell is going on.
Add to these issues, that old versions of the installer have a certificate that expires, meaning they're invalidated after an unknown period of time (thus forcing users to roll their Macs clock date back, as yet another unofficial procedure get-around).

The only thing this confirms is that Apple are bloody useless, as that article (HT201372) was published on "September 26" (post-High Sierra release, the day before) yet fails to explain how exactly users download Sierra from the MAS in the first place when it doesn't exist in there anymore; before users even bother to follow the steps they mention. 'Cart before horse'.
 
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jasminetroll said:
Mission accomplished: after installing this command-line tool, the command
mas install 1127487414​
purchased*, downloaded, and installed version 10.12.6 of


which then verified

[jtm@socrates ~]$ codesign -dv /Applications/Install\ macOS\ Sierra.app
Executable=/Applications/Install macOS Sierra.app/Contents/MacOS/InstallAssistant_springboard
Identifier=com.apple.InstallAssistant.Sierra
Format=app bundle with Mach-O thin (x86_64)
CodeDirectory v=20200 size=321 flags=0x2200(kill,library-validation) hashes=4+3 location=embedded
Signature size=4605
Info.plist entries=30
TeamIdentifier=K36BKF7T3D
Sealed Resources version=2 rules=7 files=137
Internal requirements count=1 size=124​

and worked


correctly.

* By which I mean, the program not only downloaded Sierra, it did so using the Apple-supplied App Store frameworks in /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks, resulting in an application bundle containing a properly-signed MAS receipt linked to my Apple ID.
Click to expand...


Nice. That worked for me. Do you know the number for the Mavericks installer. I downloaded it many times using my apple ID but it no longer shows up under purchases.

Thanks
 
jimthing said:
With all due respect, if you actually read the thread, we all know how to make a sodding bootable backup, that's the easy part. That's not the issue of the thread.

The issue here is Sierra itself is now NOT available from the MAS (unless you use underground tools to get it, and ONLY if you previously downloaded it pre-High Sierra release), with Apple failing to provide users any way to do so now, nor even supplying a support article with a hidden link to the MAS for it (as they did with El Capitan, last year), nor a support article explaining what the hell is going on.
Add to these issues, that old versions of the installer have a certificate that expires, meaning they're invalidated after an unknown period of time (thus forcing users to roll their Macs clock date back, as yet another unofficial procedure get-around).

The only thing this confirms is that Apple are bloody useless, as that article (HT201372) was published on "September 26" (post-High Sierra release, the day before) yet fails to explain how exactly users download Sierra from the MAS in the first place when it doesn't exist in there anymore; before users even bother to follow the steps they mention. 'Cart before horse'.
Click to expand...

My sincere apologies for trying to assist those in need who may have an installer, but may wish to make a bootable OS installer, if they have not already done so. I would not be so bold as to assume that everyone knows how to make a bootable OS installer from memory.
 
I've followed this thread with interest after forgetting to download Sierra prior to High Sierra's release.

I tried the command line tool to download Sierra but I also got the "Redownload unavailable with this Apple ID."

I was hoping this would work because I have a MacBook Pro 15" with Touch Bar that came with Sierra (that continues to run Sierra) but it must be because I didn't download the installer before it was pulled. I guess I'm out of luck then?
 
BasicGreatGuy said:
I just sent the following email to Tim Cook.

-------------------------------------------
Mr. Cook,

I purchased a 2017 27” iMac on 9/2/17. On 9/26/2017, I upgraded to High Sierra. After I upgraded, I realized that I had forgotten to download MacOS Sierra (which, as you know, came with my iMac). I proceeded to the Mac App Store to find that macOS Sierra was not listed under purchases nor was it anywhere else on the Mac App Store. As a consumer of several Apple products, I am dismayed and (frankly) upset that you have removed my ability to download Sierra and make a bootable USB installer, should something go wrong with High Sierra. I realize that Time Machine can be used to revert back to macOS Sierra. However, if there is a problem with the Time Machine backup, ( e.g. corrupt) Time Machine will be of no use to me, and I will not be able to return my new iMac to macOS Sierra.

Driving to the nearest Apple Store at the mall is not really practical either, as I would have to disconnect all the drives currently connected, pack up the iMac in the same condition as received, and carry it approximately three quarters of a mile from the parking lot to the inside location of a rather large mall.

Attempting the ‘Internet Recovery’ option is only as good as one’s connection. And if my internet connection is down or having trouble, I won’t be able to properly avail myself of said feature. That brings us back to the need for creating a USB installer.

I really don’t understand why MacOS Sierra has been silently removed from the Mac App Store. If Apple has decided on some new OS availability path, you should have seen to it, that your customers were properly notified ahead of time. We depend on the ability of the Mac App Store to provide us with our purchased products. When you selectively remove an OS that until a few days ago has been installed on a plethora of Macs, (including my new iMac) it creates potential hardship on your customers, not to mention unnecessary animus.

As a long time Apple customer, I am imploring you to change course and make macOS Sierra available for download once again in the Mac App Store. And should you wish to remove the OS again, give us customers notice, so that we are aware of what is about to transpire. In my opinion, that is the right thing to do.

Respectfully,
My name and phone number
Click to expand...

If your system came with Sierra, use the recovery mode to get Sierra again.
 
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