Batch Pie on macOS: When File Access Quietly Blocks Everything

I ran into Batch Pie (app) last night while cleaning up a pile of folders on my Mac, and it turned into one of those “this should take five minutes” evenings. You know how that goes.

The goal was simple: batch-organize and rename a few hundred files, then export some quick summaries. Nothing fancy. I’m on a MacBook Pro M1, macOS Sonoma 14.2, pretty clean system. I installed the tool, launched it, and… it opened just fine, UI loaded, no warnings. Then the moment I tried to point it at a real folder—Documents, Desktop, anything outside its own sandbox—it just silently failed. No crash, no dialog. The app acted like the files didn’t exist.

At first I assumed I’d messed something up. Maybe the import step was wrong, maybe it expected drag-and-drop only. I tried both. Same result. The interface reacted, but the file list stayed empty. That’s when the familiar macOS suspicion kicked in: permissions.

My first mistake was assuming macOS would prompt me automatically. It didn’t. I went straight to System Settings → Privacy & Security, checked Files and Folders, Full Disk Access, even Automation. The app wasn’t listed anywhere. Classic. I quit it, relaunched, tried again. Still nothing.

Second attempt was more old-school. I right-clicked the app, chose Open (to force Gatekeeper to chill), just in case notarization was involved. macOS was perfectly happy with it, so that wasn’t the issue. Apple’s own notes on Gatekeeper behavior confirmed that if the app launches without warnings, you’re usually past that stage already (support.apple.com has a solid breakdown on this).

What finally made the penny drop was realizing that some utilities don’t request file access until you explicitly trigger it in a very specific way. In this case, dragging a folder from Finder into the app wasn’t enough. The trick was using the app’s own “Choose Folder” dialog. The moment I did that, macOS popped the permission request. One click later, everything worked exactly as advertised.

For sanity, I double-checked Apple’s developer docs on sandboxed file access to make sure I wasn’t imagining things (developer.apple.com explains this behavior pretty clearly, once you know what you’re looking for). After granting access, Batch Pie immediately indexed the folder, processed files at full speed, and didn’t hiccup once. Performance was fine, even on large directories.

I ended up bookmarking this page because it mirrored the same macOS file-access quirk I hit while setting things up: https://smohamad.com/file-management/10875-batch-pie.html. It wasn’t about features; it was the reminder that Finder drag-and-drop doesn’t always equal permission in Apple’s world.

Once permissions were sorted, the rest was boring in the best way. The app behaved. No random freezes, no CPU spikes, no weird cache files sprayed across the system. It stayed in its lane, which I appreciate. For anyone wondering, there doesn’t seem to be a Mac App Store build yet; if there is one later, it’ll probably behave slightly differently due to tighter sandbox rules (apps.apple.com search will usually show it if that changes).

If I had to do this again, here’s the mental checklist I’d start with:

– Launch the app once, quit it.
– Reopen it and use its own file picker, not Finder drag-and-drop.
– Watch for the permission dialog; don’t assume it’ll appear automatically.
– If nothing shows up in Privacy & Security, the app hasn’t actually requested access yet.

That’s it. No reinstall, no Terminal hacks, no disabling system protections. Just understanding how macOS decides when an app is “allowed” to see your files.

Anyway, figured I’d share before you lose an evening to the same thing. macOS wasn’t broken, the app wasn’t broken—just one of those small Apple rules that’s obvious only after it bites you once.