Pandora doesn't work with Firefox but with Chromium
I have a brand new installation of Ubuntu 11.1. When I installed I checked the box to download the updates while installing and I also installed the additional MP3 software for the plug-ins. For some reason FireFox will not run Pandora.
FireFox really crashes with Pandora. Chromium however is doing a great job of running Pandora. Does anyone know why this may be happening so I can take steps to correct the problem?
There's probably not much you can do other than reporting the bug to Firefox.
However as an alternative you can try pithos which is a desktop client for Pandora, which alleviates the need for Flash altogether.
Pandora, like many programs, that run through the browser (until recently with the introduction of HTML5) require flash (as well as java-script) to run. Ubuntu doesn't have flash installed by default and it is necessary to install a version of it. Depending on how you installed flash, this is more likely the reason for Firefox crashing than for Ff dieing on its own. Try installing flash from the software center and try using it again. If that doesn't work, try installing from a .deb file on the adobe website.
Flash is no longer required whether you use Firefox or Chromium. (This isn't really a new thing as of this writing - but just to be clear)
Upon recently firing up Chromium and landing at the Pandora page, however, it asked me to install Flash. (Huh?!) Knowing that Pandora has supported an HTML5 playback interface sans Flash for some time [as I normally use this version via Firefox with great success], I took the following steps:
- installed a user-agent switcher extension
- changed to a profile for 'Firefox on Ubuntu'
- reloaded the Pandora page & login
- smile as music begins playing
- change user agent back to default, Pandora continues to play
FWIW, a command line alternative is also available for listening to Pandora called pianobar