[K12OSN] Can't launch Firefox

[Robert Arkiletian]

Thanks guys, I got it working as per your advice. Running first as root. 
Also, one more thing to add. I installed using the new RC1 regular 
tarball. Just untared it to the directory. The firefox-installer/ dir is 
created by running the installer based firefox download (it was 
problematic). I don't recommend this one. Also, the sym link of firefox 
as /usr/bin/mozilla did not work for some reason. It would just hang.  
So I just made the file mozilla contain the simple script

#!/bin/bash
/usr/local/firefox

As Martin Woolley suggested and it worked no problemo. Also, set the 
default school proxy by editing firefox.js in the default dir including 
the lines

pref("network.proxy.type",                  1);
pref("network.proxy.http",                  "put your school proxy here");
pref("network.proxy.http_port",             8080);

as Joe Guenther explained last month.

Thanks all for this wonderful list.

Robert Arkiletian


Terrell Prudé, Jr. wrote:

> Bill Bardon wrote:
>
>>
>> Did you perform the very first run of Firefox as root on the server?
>> Firefox on Linux requires this to properly initialize some files. 
>> I think you could still login as root, run Firefox, and all would be
>> well after that.  If not, uninstall and reinstall, then run as root the
>> first time.
>>
>
> I agree.  "Traditional" Mozilla also requires this.
>
> The newer Firefox versions, it seems, on certain distros (SuSE Linux 
> 9.1, for example) don't appear to absolutely require this anymore.  
> Just yesterday I upgraded to Firefox 1.0rc1 from 1.0PR, and I forgot 
> to run it as root (I installed the "old-fashioned" way--just unzipping 
> the tarball to an empty directory).  Worked like a charm anyway, which 
> I found rather interesting.  However, it's never wrong to run it as 
> root the first time, just in case.
>
> One other thing:  you might consider installing Firefox into a 
> directory whose name doesn't say, "Oh, I'm the install directory".  
> Better always to install to an empty directory.  I've always used 
> /usr/local/firefox, for example.  To make sure I have a rollback 
> option, I go one step further and save the most recent "old" version.  
> Something like this, using an upgrade from Firefox 0.9.3 to Firefox 
> 1.0rc1 as an example.
>
>    First, rename the "current" installation:
>
>        root at multimedia:/usr/local# mv firefox firefox-0.9.3
>
>    Now, install Firefox the usual way that you do it, into, say, 
> /usr/local/firefox.  When done, do this:
>
>        root at multimedia:/usr/local# mv firefox firefox-1.0rc1
>
>    Now, symlink the new installation to the name "firefox":
>
>       root at multimedia:/usr/local# ln -s firefox-1.0rc1 firefox
>
> Of course, you could simply install the new one into "firefox-1.0rc1" 
> if you're using the firefox-installer, but the "traditional" package 
> untar's into "firefox/".  Thus, this method will work with that, too.
>
> --TP