HowTo: Install firefox-15.0.tar.bz2 in Linux

Idownloaded Firefox version 15.0 from mozilla ftp server. The name of file is firefox-15.0.tar.bz2. How do I install Firefox under any Debian / Ubuntu / Fedora or any Linux distribution?

Firefox is a free and open source web browser from Mozilla. Firefox version 15 has been released and fixes major issue related to add-on memory leaks. It also includes support for the new Opus audio format and includes a new feature called silent updates.

Step #1: Download Firefox 15

Download Firefox version 15 from the download page to your /tmp directory. Make sure you close Firefox if it's running. Open a command line-terminal and go to your /tmp directory, enter:
$ cd /tmp
If you've not saved or downloaded Firefox 15, use the wget command as follows:
$ wget 'http://ftp.jaist.ac.jp/pub/mozilla.org/firefox/releases/15.0/linux-i686/en-US/firefox-15.0.tar.bz2'
OR, you can download 64 bit version using the following command:
$ wget 'http://ftp.jaist.ac.jp/pub/mozilla.org/firefox/releases/15.0/linux-x86_64/en-US/firefox-15.0.tar.bz2'
Sample outputs:

 
--2012-08-29 08:43:55--  http://ftp.jaist.ac.jp/pub/mozilla.org/firefox/releases/15.0/linux-x86_64/en-US/firefox-15.0.tar.bz2
Resolving nas02... 192.168.1.11
Connecting to nas02|192.168.1.11|:3128... connected.
Proxy request sent, awaiting response... 200 OK
Length: 21260545 (20M) [application/x-bzip2]
Saving to: `firefox-15.0.tar.bz2'
 
100%[==========================================>] 2,12,60,545  414K/s   in 63s
 
2012-08-29 08:44:59 (331 KB/s) - `firefox-15.0.tar.bz2' saved [21260545/21260545]
 
 

Step #2: Extract and Install firefox-15.0.tar.bz2 Tar Ball

To extract the contents of the downloaded file called irefox-15.0.tar.bz2 and install into /opt directory, enter:
$ tar -jxvf firefox-15.0.tar.bz2 -C /opt
Sample outputs:

firefox/
firefox/libnssdbm3.so
firefox/updater.ini
firefox/icons/
firefox/icons/updater.png
firefox/icons/mozicon128.png
firefox/components/
firefox/components/libbrowsercomps.so
....
..
...
firefox/dictionaries/en-US.dic
firefox/libssl3.so
firefox/crashreporter.ini
firefox/libmozalloc.so
firefox/libmozsqlite3.so
firefox/precomplete

If you can not install Firefox 15 in /opt directory, due to permission issues; use the following command to install FF15 in your own home directory:
$ mkdir ~/firfox
$ tar jxvf firefox-*.tar.bz2 -C ~/firfox

Step #3: Start Firefox 15 under Linux

First, make sure you backup ~/.mozilla/ directory, enter:
$ mkdir ~/backups
$ cp -avr ~/.mozilla/ ~/backups
To start Firefox, type the firefox command script in the firefox directory:
$ /opt/firefox/firefox
OR
$ ~/firefox1/firefox/firefox
Sample outputs:

A Note about your bookmarks and browsing history (Am I going to lose them?)

You won't lose any of your bookmarks or browsing history when you run Firefox v15, but some of your extensions and other add-ons might not work until updates for them are made available.

Check out related media

This tutorial also available in video format:

• Tweet
• 
• 

You should follow me on twitter here or grab rss feed to keep track of new changes.

Featured Articles:

• 30 Handy Bash Shell Aliases For Linux / Unix / Mac OS X
• Top 30 Nmap Command Examples For Sys/Network Admins
• 25 PHP Security Best Practices For Sys Admins
• 20 Linux System Monitoring Tools Every SysAdmin Should Know
• 20 Linux Server Hardening Security Tips
• Linux: 20 Iptables Examples For New SysAdmins
• Top 20 OpenSSH Server Best Security Practices
• Top 20 Nginx WebServer Best Security Practices
• 20 Examples: Make Sure Unix / Linux Configuration Files Are Free From Syntax Errors
• 15 Greatest Open Source Terminal Applications Of 2012
• My 10 UNIX Command Line Mistakes
• Top 10 Open Source Web-Based Project Management Software
• Top 5 Email Client For Linux, Mac OS X, and Windows Users
• The Novice Guide To Buying A Linux Laptop