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> I really want to install apps without entrusting my entire hard drive to them.

This is what macOS enforces - apps live within their containers.

That sounds interesting. There must be apps that do require full access (like a finder alternative), so I wonder if you can know to trust an app to be isolated just by looking at it.

Apps distributed through the App Store are required to be sandboxed. Apps you install from elsewhere may or may not be.

https://developer.apple.com/library/archive/documentation/Se...

*New apps

"New" is a relative term. Sandboxing has been required on the Mac App Store for roughly ten years now -- I doubt there's anything left from before that requirement was enforced.

flatpak does this on Linux. There is an official-from Mozilla flatpak available for Firefox.

It has some interesting side effects. For example Zoom links don't work in the Flatpack version of Firefox. Ironically the Zoom app Firefox tries to open is in itself a Flatpack app. Not sure if this is by design or if there is a way to fix it.

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