Hey—so I spent part of yesterday evening poking at Griffin Typing (app) on macOS, and I figured I’d write this down the same way I’d explain it to you over coffee, while it’s still fresh in my head.
I ran into it through an OrchardKit-style directory of Mac software, under education and typing tools. Looked harmless enough. Lightweight. Supposed to help with structured typing practice and accuracy. I wasn’t planning a deep dive; I just wanted to install it, run a few exercises, see if it was usable, and move on.
That plan lasted about ten minutes before macOS stepped in.
What I wanted to do was trivial: launch the app, load its built-in lessons, type, done. No external hardware, no weird system hooks, no admin-level stuff. I’m on macOS Sonoma 14.3, MacBook Air M2. Clean system, no third-party keyboard drivers, nothing exotic.
I double-clicked the app.
macOS immediately threw the familiar “can’t be opened” / “app is damaged or can’t be verified” behavior. No crash report, just a hard stop. You know the one—it feels like the OS slapping your hand away before you even touch the stove.
What I tried first (and why it didn’t help)
My first move was pure muscle memory. Right-click → Open. Confirm the dialog. Try again.
Same result.
Then I moved the app into /Applications, because macOS still treats anything launched from Downloads with extra suspicion. Tried again. Still blocked.
At this point I briefly assumed the bundle was actually broken. Corrupted download, maybe. I re-downloaded it, verified the checksum matched, repeated the whole thing.
Nope. Same message.
This is usually where people give up and blame the app. But the behavior was too consistent. The OS wasn’t confused. It was very confident.
What finally clicked in my head
This wasn’t a crash. It wasn’t a bad binary. It was Gatekeeper doing exactly what it’s designed to do—just without much explanation.
Recent macOS versions are very strict about notarization. If an app isn’t notarized, or if it was modified after signing (which happens a lot with smaller educational tools), Gatekeeper may not even show the “Open Anyway” button unless you go looking for it.
Apple explains the rules here, in their usual calm, lawyerly tone: https://support.apple.com/guide/mac-help/open-a-mac-app-from-an-unidentified-developer-mh40616/mac
The key realization: you don’t fix this by clicking the app harder. You fix it in System Settings.
What actually worked
Instead of trying to launch the app again, I opened System Settings → Privacy & Security and scrolled down. Past all the obvious stuff.
Sure enough, there was a small notice saying the app had been blocked from use because it couldn’t be verified, with an Open Anyway button next to it. No notification earlier. No alert badge. Just sitting there quietly.
I clicked Open Anyway, confirmed once more, then launched the app again from Finder.
This time it opened instantly. No warnings. No drama.
Apple’s developer-side explanation of why this happens lives here, if you want the technical background: https://developer.apple.com/documentation/security/notarizing_macos_software_before_distribution
The short version is that macOS treats unsigned educational tools the same way it treats any unknown binary. Intent doesn’t matter.
A quick trust sanity check
Before overriding Gatekeeper, I wanted to make sure I wasn’t doing something dumb. I spent a few minutes checking context around the app—what category it lives in, who it’s aimed at, whether it behaves like a normal offline tool.
I found this page useful while doing that background check and figuring out how it fits into macOS environments: https://sznurkowo.com/education/31162-griffin-typing.html
That was enough to convince me I wasn’t punching a hole in system security for no reason.
How the app behaved after launch
Once it was allowed to run, everything was… boring. In a good way.
No extra permission prompts. No request for microphone access. No screen recording nonsense. CPU usage stayed low. Keyboard input felt normal, no lag, no strange key capture behavior.
That’s important for typing tools. If something hooks too deeply into input events, you feel it immediately. This one didn’t.
I also checked whether there was a Mac App Store version, since those are pre-notarized and sandboxed by default. Nothing obvious yet, but if it ever shows up officially, this whole Gatekeeper dance will disappear: https://apps.apple.com/us/search?term=Griffin%20Typing
What I would do next time (the short checklist)
If I had to install this again on another Mac, I’d do it like this, no detours:
- Install and move the app to
/Applications - Go straight to Privacy & Security
- Look for the blocked app notice
- Click Open Anyway once
- Launch normally after that
That’s it. No Terminal commands. No disabling Gatekeeper globally. No reboots.
Why I’m telling you all this
This isn’t really about Griffin Typing. It’s about how macOS increasingly fails quietly when it thinks it’s protecting you. Especially with smaller OrchardKit-style educational apps that don’t go through Apple’s full distribution pipeline.
When something “can’t be opened” but doesn’t crash, doesn’t log, and doesn’t explain itself, assume Gatekeeper made a decision on your behalf—and hid the explanation in Settings.
Once you know that, it’s predictable. Until then, it just feels broken.
Anyway. That was my little macOS adventure last night. Hopefully this saves you some time the next time an innocent-looking app refuses to cooperate.