Mungempo (app) on macOS: When File Access Breaks Everything
I installed Mungempo (app) from OrchardKit expecting a simple file management helper. Judging by the slug and category, it’s clearly some kind of local file organizer or batch-processing utility. Nothing exotic. Just something to clean up and restructure a messy Downloads folder on my MacBook Pro (Intel, macOS Sonoma 14.4).
Instead, I got the spinning beach ball of silence.
The app launched fine. No Gatekeeper drama, no “damaged” warning. It opened instantly, UI rendered clean. But the moment I pointed it to a folder with about 12,000 mixed files (PDFs, PNGs, archives), it froze for a solid 20 seconds. Then the window went unresponsive.
At first, I assumed it was just chewing through metadata. So I waited.
Bad idea.
First Guess: Performance Issue
Activity Monitor showed CPU usage spiking to 180%, then dropping to zero. RAM stable at ~220 MB. Disk I/O was weirdly quiet. That’s when it felt less like “heavy processing” and more like “blocked.”
I tried again with a smaller folder. Same freeze.
Then I tested it with a folder located inside iCloud Drive. That’s when I noticed something subtle: the freeze only happened with directories inside Documents and iCloud Drive. External SSD? Worked instantly.
That narrowed it down.
The Real Problem: macOS Privacy Permissions
Since macOS Mojave, apps need explicit permission to access Desktop, Documents, Downloads, iCloud Drive, and external volumes. If permission is denied or not properly requested, macOS blocks access silently.
Apple’s breakdown of these privacy controls is here: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT210422
The odd part? Mungempo never asked for permission. No popup. No prompt. It just tried to read files and stalled.
This usually means one of two things:
- The app requested permission before, and it was denied.
- The privacy database (TCC) is in a weird state.
In my case, I vaguely remembered clicking “Don’t Allow” during first launch. Muscle memory.
What Didn’t Work
First attempt: add the tool to Full Disk Access in System Settings → Privacy & Security.
It improved responsiveness slightly, but the freeze still happened intermittently. Full Disk Access doesn’t always override folder-specific restrictions cleanly.
Second attempt: reinstall the build. Drag to Trash, re-download, relaunch.
Same behavior.
At that point, I dug deeper.
What Actually Fixed It
The real fix was resetting the privacy permissions database for the app entirely.
In Terminal:
tccutil reset All com.orchardkit.mungempo
(Replace the bundle ID if needed.)
After that, I launched it again. This time macOS finally prompted:
“Allow Mungempo to access files in your Documents folder?”
Clicked Allow.
Instant difference.
No freeze. No beach ball. File tree loaded in under two seconds. Even a 10k-file directory scanned smoothly.
If you want technical context on how notarization and permissions interplay at the system level, Apple documents their security model here: https://developer.apple.com/documentation/security/notarizing_macos_software_before_distribution
This wasn’t a notarization issue. It was purely TCC (Transparency, Consent, and Control) blocking file reads without obvious feedback.
Quick Sanity Check
I searched the Mac App Store to see whether OrchardKit distributes a sandboxed version there (which would handle permissions more predictably): https://apps.apple.com/us/search?term=Mungempo
Didn’t find an official listing.
I also bookmarked this page about macOS systems and file management behavior while troubleshooting because it confirmed others were running it on recent builds without catastrophic bugs: https://planetgpa.com/file-management/72942-mungempo.html
That helped rule out “broken release” paranoia.
Why It Looked Like a Performance Bug
The freeze wasn’t CPU overload. It was macOS denying folder enumeration calls. When the tool tried to scan directories it didn’t have permission to access, the system effectively stalled the operation. From the user side, it just looked like bad optimization.
That’s the trap with file utilities on modern macOS. If permissions are off, the failure mode doesn’t scream “permission denied.” It just… hangs.
On my Intel machine, once permissions were correctly granted, it processed about 15,000 files in ~6 seconds. CPU usage peaked at 140%, which is completely reasonable for metadata indexing.
If I Had To Do It Again
I’d follow this sequence:
- Install and move to Applications.
- Launch once.
- If no permission dialog appears, reset TCC immediately.
- Relaunch and explicitly grant folder access.
No need for Full Disk Access unless the app genuinely needs system-wide visibility.
Final Take
Mungempo (app) itself is fine. Stable. Lightweight. Does what a file utility should do.
The real friction was macOS privacy controls silently blocking it, turning a simple folder scan into what looked like a broken build.
If a file management tool freezes on Sonoma but works on external drives, don’t blame performance first. Check permissions. Reset TCC. Relaunch clean.
That’s the difference between an hour of frustration and a five-minute fix.