How I am supposed to update Firefox in a root-only location when it refuses to start as root using sudo?
I am using a custom installation of Firefox on Fedora located in /usr/local/firefox. This location is (obviously) read-only for an ordinary user and can be written to by root only. I don't want to make the installation directory writable by ordinary user, so when notified by Firefox that it could not install updates I used sudo to start it in a root privilege mode to allow installation of the updates, then I shut it down and started as an ordinary user again. Beginning version 60 this is no more possible, requiring either complete manual install, or starting a complete Gnome/KDE session for root just to allow Firefox to update (sorta clumsy...). If it is absolutely necessary to refuse starting under sudo, wouldn't it be possible to provide something like update-only mode of the browser which would allow running as root under sudo? Thanx.
All Replies (3)
The Firefox folder needs read/write permissions for the user to get updates if using the official builds from www.mozilla.org/firefox/all/ and not a third-party package from a repository.
A lot of people either place the extracted Firefox tarball in a folder in Home to make it easy or make sure folder has read/permissions if elsewhere.
Ilungisiwe ngu James
Thank you, James, for the response, but it does not quite solve my issue. I am not the only user of the system, thus installing it into my home directory is not an option at all. And, as I stated in my question, I don't want to make the installation directory writable by users - it is very undesirable.
Tell me what classes the other users are in, that would be helpful. you could always set the permissions to +r [i forget what numbers to type] for said users only and run it as root to upgrade when needed or is that not desirable?