Everlasting browser updates (also after EOL)

Solution 1:

You can download firefox and install it to a local directory to receive automatic updates regardless of which version of Ubuntu you are using.

First, download firefox for Linux 64-bit from this webpage.

Then, run the following command to create a local bin directory:

mkdir ~/bin

Next, extract the firefox download and place the "firefox" directory in your ~/bin directory.

Finally, you will need to create a launcher desktop file so you can start firefox by clicking a firefox icon.

First, run the following commands to create the needed file and directories (ignore warnings):

mkdir -p ~/.local/share/applications
touch ~/.local/share/applications/firefox-local.desktop
chmod +x ~/.local/share/applications/firefox-local.desktop

Next, copy and paste the following into ~/.local/share/applications/firefox-local.desktop using your favorite file editor:

[Desktop Entry]
Name=Firefox Local
Comment=Web Browser
Exec=HOME/bin/firefox/firefox %u
Terminal=false
Type=Application
Icon=HOME/bin/firefox/browser/chrome/icons/default/default128.png
Categories=Network;WebBrowser;
MimeType=text/html;text/xml;application/xhtml+xml;application/xml;application/vnd.mozilla.xul+xml;application/rss+xml;application/rdf+xml;image/gif;image/jpeg;image/png;x-scheme-handler/http;x-scheme-handler/https;
StartupNotify=true

Save the file and then run the following command to correct the paths in your file:

sed -i "s|HOME|$HOME|g" ~/.local/share/applications/firefox-local.desktop

Finally, log out and log back in and you should have an application called "firefox local" you can run and this version of firefox should automatically update when you start the application.

To verify that firefox is updated, press ALT+H and then press A.

To verify you are using the manually downloaded version of firefox, first start up firefox local and then run the following command and it should show /home/<username>/firefox/firefox instead of /usr/lib/firefox or /usr/bin/firefox:

pgrep -a firefox