What are the risks of installing the latest version of FF?

[natan2021]

Hi guys! I know there are topics here dealing with this subject, but I couldn't identify my question raised in the subject, referring to Firefox. I'm actually wondering why I'm thinking about upgrading its version as its performance is lower compared to chrome. I thought it might be Compiz, because I believe that framework (if I'm misphrasing myself, please correct me) makes considerable demands on the processor and ram (I even noticed that after disabling Compiz, the browser performance improved).

Debian 10.9 Mate

[vmclark]

You didn't state what version your using. Yes, FF is a bit slower than Chrome, but for me its more stable. I'm using FF version 89, and its much faster than previous versions.
I guess its how you use your browser that makes a difference. A second or two slower than Chrome doesn't make any difference to me. I rarely open more a two tabs at a time. Don't need a reason to open any more.

[natan2021]

You didn't state what version your using. Yes, FF is a bit slower than Chrome, but for me its more stable. I'm using FF version 89, and its much faster than previous versions.
I guess its how you use your browser that makes a difference. A second or two slower than Chrome doesn't make any difference to me. I rarely open more a two tabs at a time. Don't need a reason to open any more.

I'm using version (78) that comes with this Debian. I noticed that Compiz interferes with the performance of the entire system, including applications. But I would also like to know what the risks, in relation to the stability of the system, of me using this Firefox 89 (latest), since it is not part of the Debian repositories yet.

[Bulkley]

natan2021, if past experience is telling, Debian developers are working on updating Firefox-esr. Your question should become moot soon.

The simple answer is that the risks are most likely minimal. In the past I downloaded a FF tar.bz2, untared it and ran it in my ~/user space without actually installing it. You can try that. Look for firefox-89.0.tar.bz2.

[natan2021]

natan2021, if past experience is telling, Debian developers are working on updating Firefox-esr. Your question should become moot soon.

The simple answer is that the risks are most likely minimal. In the past I downloaded a FF tar.bz2, untared it and ran it in my ~/user space without actually installing it. You can try that. Look for firefox-89.0.tar.bz2.

What if I want to install this version (89) instead of leaving it as a binary executable?

[Bulkley]

What if I want to install this version (89) instead of leaving it as a binary executable?

Then look for a .deb. MX Linux uses Firefox and has 89. You can probably find it in their repository.

While it is possible to install from a tar file I prefer debs because they are easier to remove after I'm done with them.

One other possibility is a flatpak.

[natan2021]

What if I want to install this version (89) instead of leaving it as a binary executable?

Then look for a .deb. MX Linux uses Firefox and has 89. You can probably find it in their repository.

While it is possible to install from a tar file I prefer debs because they are easier to remove after I'm done with them.

One other possibility is a flatpak.

Ok, thanks friend.

[ticojohn]

Just my two cents worth. I have almost always found that the Firefox-ESR releases found in Debian repos to be just as good as the regular Firefox releases. The version numbers don't match but as best as I can tell, by looking at the Mozilla web page, Firefox 89 and Firefox-ESR 78.11 are virtually identical. They have the same same security updates, etc. And if you think about it, the current Firefox-ESR is 78.11, while Firefox is 89. Not that they are exactly equal but the ESR version 78 and dot release 11 == 89. I would personally stick with Firefox-ESR. But if you must have the SNS, extracting the .tar.gz into a folder in you home directory should work the sane as actually installing the .deb from Mozilla. And I am personally more comfortable with NOT installing .deb packages from anywhere other than from the Debian repo. Again, just my two cents.

[stevepusser]

Just my two cents worth. I have almost always found that the Firefox-ESR releases found in Debian repos to be just as good as the regular Firefox releases. The version numbers don't match but as best as I can tell, by looking at the Mozilla web page, Firefox 89 and Firefox-ESR 78.11 are virtually identical. They have the same same security updates, etc. And if you think about it, the current Firefox-ESR is 78.11, while Firefox is 89. Not that they are exactly equal but the ESR version 78 and dot release 11 == 89. I would personally stick with Firefox-ESR. But if you must have the SNS, extracting the .tar.gz into a folder in you home directory should work the sane as actually installing the .deb from Mozilla. And I am personally more comfortable with NOT installing .deb packages from anywhere other than from the Debian repo. Again, just my two cents.

Last that I heard, Mozilla provides static binaries in a tarball archive, not any debs. I'm the guy that set up the MX system for bundling those static binaries into i386 or amd64 debs in our repo, so am reasonably familiar with what they add--desktop files, disabling update notifications, default to the MX Linux home page, etc. Basically they do automatically what everyone else has you do manually with those binaries after a download.

http://mxrepo.com/mx/repo/pool/main/f/firefox/

Now, some assume they can just blithely add the Sid repo to Stable and update Firefox safely. That way lies madness.

[natan2021]

Just my two cents worth. I have almost always found that the Firefox-ESR releases found in Debian repos to be just as good as the regular Firefox releases. The version numbers don't match but as best as I can tell, by looking at the Mozilla web page, Firefox 89 and Firefox-ESR 78.11 are virtually identical. They have the same same security updates, etc. And if you think about it, the current Firefox-ESR is 78.11, while Firefox is 89. Not that they are exactly equal but the ESR version 78 and dot release 11 == 89. I would personally stick with Firefox-ESR. But if you must have the SNS, extracting the .tar.gz into a folder in you home directory should work the sane as actually installing the .deb from Mozilla. And I am personally more comfortable with NOT installing .deb packages from anywhere other than from the Debian repo. Again, just my two cents.

Last that I heard, Mozilla provides static binaries in a tarball archive, not any debs. I'm the guy that set up the MX system for bundling those static binaries into i386 or amd64 debs in our repo, so am reasonably familiar with what they add--desktop files, disabling update notifications, default to the MX Linux home page, etc. Basically they do automatically what everyone else has you do manually with those binaries after a download.

http://mxrepo.com/mx/repo/pool/main/f/firefox/

Now, some assume they can just blithely add the Sid repo to Stable and update Firefox safely. That way lies madness.

Of the .deb amd64 installers that appear at "http://mxrepo.com/mx/repo/pool/main/f/firefox/", which one do you recommend most for the Debian I use (10.9 Mate)?

[ticojohn]

Last that I heard, Mozilla provides static binaries in a tarball archive, not any debs. I'm the guy that set up the MX system for bundling those static binaries into i386 or amd64 debs in our repo, so am reasonably familiar with what they add--desktop files, disabling update notifications, default to the MX Linux home page, etc. Basically they do automatically what everyone else has you do manually with those binaries after a download.

http://mxrepo.com/mx/repo/pool/main/f/firefox/

Now, some assume they can just blithely add the Sid repo to Stable and update Firefox safely. That way lies madness.

Thanks for that clarification. I guess I had blindly assumed that the Firefox 89 download was a .deb, but I just looked at their web page and it is indeed a tarball. My Bad. But is it true or false that Firefox and Firefox-ESR are pretty much the same? In any case, I still advocate for using what is in the Debian repo. And, yeah mixing Sid with Stable is a really bad route to madness (Sid!!!).

[manntraxx]

Hi there!

The latest Firefox ESR is far from the newest version of FF. Here is a quote from the Debian Handbook (https://debian-handbook.info/browse/ca- ... wsers.html):

Mozilla has a very fast-paced release cycle for Firefox. New releases are published every six to eight weeks and only the latest version is supported for security issues. This doesn't suit all kind of users so, every 10 cycles, they are promoting one of their release to an Extended Support Release (ESR) which will get security updates (and no functional changes) during the next 10 cycles (which covers a bit more than a year).
Debian has both versions packaged. The ESR one, in the package firefox-esr, is used by default since it is the only version suitable for Debian Stable with its long support period (and even there Debian has to upgrade from one ESR release to the next multiple times during a Debian Stable lifecycle). The regular Firefox is available in the firefox package but it is only available to users of Debian Unstable.

That said, I do not think there are significant risks to running the latest version on FF - if the new features are important to you.

Have a great day!

[stevepusser]

Because all the different MX debs you see for Firefox bundle the exact same precompiled binary files from Mozilla, they end up being fungible (finally got to use that word!) that is, interchangeable for a given architecture for different MX releases. MX 19 is the Buster-based MX version, though.

If we were able to build it from Sid's source files on Buster, which is not feasible until Buster gets a newer Rust toolchain, then the packages would be quite different and tied to the release they were built upon.

[craigevil]

Just download the version from Mozilla, extract, the create a firefox.desktop file and copy it to /usr/applications
or ./local/share/applications

Now you have the newest Firefox, when the next version is released just download and extract over the old firefox folder.

This way it doesn't overwrite your old Firefox profile and you can mess with tweaking it, if it breaks, just delete the firefox folder and extract a new one.

You could also install the new version from flatpak or snap.

[stevepusser]

If someone had a few minutes, they could repackage the MX sources in their own repo, such as on the OBS. (which is free as in beer) Feel free to change whatever you want to call the package. But someone would have to ask for it.

Then after a user adds that OBS repo and key, they would get apt updates, without worrying about the many other updates from MX. MX only provides x86 FF packages, since that's all Mozilla builds. Debian provides many other builds from source for various extra platforms.

[natan2021]

Well, I preferred to go back to using the 78 version of the Debian archive as I saw performance in general is a little better, at least on my acer i5 4gb ssd notebook.

Guys, as the speed of interaction here with you guys is much higher than in the other topics I opened, I want one of you to help with another question: How can I boot the system without having to type username and password?

[stevepusser]

All I know it we made that an option for MX's XFCE desktops, as insecure as it is. I don't think XFCE makes it easy to set.

I put the MX Firefox sources on the OBS and had it build some packages: https://build.opensuse.org/package/show ... ox/firefox