Mozilla Introduces .deb Packages for Firefox Developer Edition and Beta

Mozilla previously launched a Nightly package for Debian-based Linux distributions. Now, a .deb package is also available for Firefox Developer Edition and Beta.

A new APT repository has been established to facilitate the installation of Firefox as a .deb package. These packages maintain compatibility with the same Debian and Ubuntu versions as the standard Firefox binaries.

User feedback is crucial; reporting any encountered issues can help enhance the overall experience.

Utilizing Mozilla’s Firefox .deb package provides several advantages:

• Enhanced performance is achieved through advanced compiler-based optimizations.
• The latest updates are delivered promptly, as the .deb package is integrated directly into Firefox’s release process.
• Binaries are hardened with all security flags activated during compilation.
• Browsing can continue after a package upgrade, allowing users to restart Firefox at their convenience to access the newest version.

To configure the APT repository and install the Firefox .deb package, follow these instructions:

<code># Create a directory to store APT repository keys if it doesn't exist:
sudo install -d -m 0755 /etc/apt/keyrings

# Import the Mozilla APT repository signing key:
wget -q <a class="c-link" href="https://packages.mozilla.org/apt/repo-signing-key.gpg" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-stringify-link="https://packages.mozilla.org/apt/repo-signing-key.gpg" data-sk="tooltip_parent">https://packages.mozilla.org/apt/repo-signing-key.gpg</a> -O- | sudo tee /etc/apt/keyrings/packages.mozilla.org.asc > /dev/null

# The fingerprint should be 35BAA0B33E9EB396F59CA838C0BA5CE6DC6315A3
gpg -n -q --import --import-options import-show /etc/apt/keyrings/packages.mozilla.org.asc | awk '/pub/{getline; gsub(/^ +| +$/,""); print "\n"$0"\n"}'

# Next, add the Mozilla APT repository to your sources list:
echo "deb [signed-by=/etc/apt/keyrings/packages.mozilla.org.asc] <a class="c-link" href="https://packages.mozilla.org/apt" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-stringify-link="https://packages.mozilla.org/apt" data-sk="tooltip_parent">https://packages.mozilla.org/apt</a> mozilla main" | sudo tee -a /etc/apt/sources.list.d/mozilla.list > /dev/null

# Update your package list and install the Firefox .deb package:
sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install firefox-beta  # Replace "beta" by "devedition" for Developer Edition

The latest Firefox Beta/Developer Edition .deb package is now installed on the Linux system.

Firefox supports over a hundred locales. While the primary packages are in American English, .deb packages for Firefox language packs are also available. To install a specific language pack, replace ‘fr’ in the following example with the desired language code:

sudo apt-get install firefox-beta-l10n-fr

To view all available language packs, this command can be used after adding the Mozilla APT repository and executing sudo apt-get update:

apt-cache search firefox-beta-l10n