Starting on November 11, an Apple bug can prevent DropDMG and EagleFiler from launching. You may see a “Couldn't parse receipt” error in the Console, followed by “Service exited with abnormal code: 173.”

The problem seems to be that the certificate in the App Store’s receipt expired. In some cases, when you try to launch the app you’ll get a dialog from the App Store saying that the app was purchased on another Mac and asking you to enter your Apple ID password. Sometimes this will cause the system to download a new receipt, and everything will work. If entering your password doesn’t help, we’ve heard some reports that it helps to restart the Mac and try again. Make sure that your Mac can connect to the Internet, or it won’t be able to download the new certificate.

However, sometimes the OS will (for unknown reasons) still not be able to download a new receipt. In this case, it will report that the application is damaged and that you need to “download it again from the App Store.” To do this, open the Applications folder, drag the app to the trash, and empty it. (If you have any other copies of the app, delete them, too.) Then go to the Purchased tab in the App Store app and click Install to re-download the app.

We’ve also seen cases where the re-downloaded app doesn’t launch, either. Currently, it looks like this is a problem that Apple will need to fix, however you can download the direct sale version of DropDMG or EagleFiler and run it in trial mode (fully functional) until the problem is resolved. (Contact us if you’d like a temporary serial number to remove the demo reminders.) Since the bug seems to affect every app on the Mac App Store, we expect there to be a solution soon.

This post will be updated as more information becomes available.