Unintended consequences of planting Firefox 87 in Buster

[Éric]

My first installation of Debian went fairly well. For some reason I absolutely wanted to install the *latest* version of Firefox and followed these [1] instructions. I must have missed a step : the amount of packages I saw scrolling downloading and installing thereafter was simply ungood. I'm left with a fairly fonctional desktop, however some packages appear broken and cannot be installed or even "fixed".

Things I cannot install include Déjà Dup, which mean I cannot restore my pre-install backup, which is embarassing. (Yes, duplicity still works, but …)

I've been giving some hard thinking and I'm now ready to live with the old version of Firefox packaged with Debian 10.9 "Buster".

Now my question : is there a way to have all my repositories and packages back in a row again ?

Yesterday I saw a webpage [2] about a similar situation, where the method for rolling back involved slashing through dpkg-install.log with awk and plenty of rare commands and arcane parameters to apt, but I am not sure I could enact it without further catastrophe.

In a word, I'm stuck.

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[1] https://www.linuxuprising.com/2019/12/h ... n-esr.html
[2] https://unix.stackexchange.com/question ... ong#236711

[Head_on_a_Stick]

followed these [1] instructions

Oh dear. Even if you had followed the pinning instructions that "guide" would still have broken your system in a very fundamental, albeit more subtle, way because the firefox package in sid depends on the sid glibc (libc6) version.

The person who wrote that "guide" is a ****** idiot who doesn't know what they're talking about. You really shouldn't follow random guides on the internet.

Things I cannot install include Déjà Dup, which mean I cannot restore my pre-install backup

A backup technique that relies on a working system is pretty useless. You should find another method.

is there a way to have all my repositories and packages back in a row again ?

You can try the emergency downgrade mentioned in your "guide", here is a version of it from Debian's official documentation:

https://www.debian.org/doc/manuals/debi ... owngrading

^ That describes a downgrade to testing/bookworm, you should replace that with stable/buster instead.

But it might not work...

[Deb-fan]

Not reinventing the already endlessly reinvented wheel. An unproven backup/restore method is well, an unproven backup/restore method and clearly shouldn't be used.

Almost always have gotten Firefox downloaded directly from Mozilla and run it from a directory in users home. Always latest, automatically updates as it does on other platforms ie: Windows if opted for in browser settings and info on how to do so is already all over the webz. You live, you learn ... you bork ... you learn.

[VA1DER]

My first installation of Debian went fairly well. For some reason I absolutely wanted to install the *latest* version of Firefox...

If the first thing you are doing after installing Debian is looking for bleeding-edge anything, then you might want to ask yourself if Debian is the right distribution for you. Debian's basic raison d'etre is stability. It is, by choice and design, a very conservative distribution that is designed to give you a good base of features which work in the wide possible set of circumstances. After the heat death of the universe, I suspect there will still be a Debian server running somewhere. The one thing they are not is bleeding edge, and trying to shoehorn the absolute latest release of something into a Debian install, well, you see the sometimes consequences.

There are some very good Debian-based alternatives available for you. If the latest software is important to you, then you might want to consider Ubuntu. If you want a good compromise between Debian's ultra-conservatism and Ubuntu's bleeding edge then Mint is a great way to go, and also my personal choice for the desktop. Mint is based on Ubuntu, so is generally more up-to-date than Debian, but they base themselves off of the current Ubuntu Long-Term-Service version which gives them a more conservative base than the very latest Ubuntu. They also have a much more Debian-esque attitude about software freedom than Ubuntu and are showing some impressive mettle in saying no to some of Ubuntu's burgeoning commercialism.

All in all, Debian on the desktop is a fine choice, but it is the choice for someone who needs conservative software choices to ensure everything just works.

[Deb-fan]

After the heat death of the universe, I suspect there will still be a Debian server running somewhere.

LAO ... nice.

OP not saying give up on having latest Firefox either, plenty of ways to do so, already mentioned the one I'm most fond of and information on the process is readily available. Many desktop nixers do reasonably enough want latest browsers, oh well ... Debian's focus in stable is on stablity and many of us endusers are grateful for that too. Still plenty of ways to do just about anything when it comes to gnu/Linux and tech ...

oops, 2 cents on backup method for me = rsync. Also no shortage of info on it online. Doesn't sound like what you're relying on now is tops in reliability, check your options. Linux users generally have several.

[stevepusser]

Well, if you do want a safe, yet dead easy, way to use the latest FF, MX bundles the latest binaries from Mozilla for amd64 and i386 into debs, and adds some trimmings like menu entries and an addition to the alternatives system. It's the same method as the last method listed in your "uprising" guide, but made even easier, and are pretty much safe on any Debian version. http://mxrepo.com/mx/repo/pool/main/f/firefox/

Do you know how to install a single standalone .deb file on Debian?

[Head_on_a_Stick]

safe

What about when FF is updated? Installing a single .deb would leave it out of date after a while, which doesn't seem very safe for such a security-critical application.

I agree with VA1DER's post but installing Mozilla's tarball in "$HOME" is probably the best way to run the non-ESR version in Debian stable. See the Frequently Asked Questions thread for a link to other methods.

[stevepusser]

safe

What about when FF is updated? Installing a single .deb would leave it out of date after a while, which doesn't seem very safe for such a security-critical application.

I agree with VA1DER's post but installing Mozilla's tarball in "$HOME" is probably the best way to run the non-ESR version in Debian stable. See the Frequently Asked Questions thread for a link to other methods.

Then, since you haven't added the MX repo (don't), you'll have to check that repo link and update it manually. MX users get automatic updates from the repo.

If you want FF to update itself, manually install the mozilla binaries in your home folder someplace, as has been already detailed in this forum roughly a googleplex times.

[kedaha]

I am a staunch firefox-esr man but an alternative for those who hanker after the very latest Firefox in Buster is to use snap, which is available from Debian's main repository. Be aware however that this method is not recommended by all; see, for example sunrat's comments in a similar forum topic, but each to his own. If I may pontificate: Stability and security are the Debian way rather than using new and shiny software.

Code: Select all

# apt install snapd
# snap install firefox

To install the GUI:

Code: Select all

# snap install snap-store

If the icon doesn't appear in your desktop then a firefox.desktop file will be necessary in /usr/share/applications:

Code: Select all

# cp /var/lib/snapd/desktop/applications/firefox_firefox.desktop /usr/share/applications/

And voilá! You now have the current latest Firefox:

Code: Select all

$ snap list |grep firefox
firefox            87.0-3                      512    latest/stable  mozilla*