How do I install the latest stable version of Firefox?

I want to install the latest Firefox on my Ubuntu (64bit) box.

What is the best way to do this? Is there a specific update site or should I download the binaries manually? If doing manually, in which directory should I put the files? In my home directory, or is there a better place?

Solution 1:

The latest version of Firefox is available for as a security updates in all supported releases of Ubuntu, just doing a normal update will pull it in. You need to enable at least one of the security or updates repositories (e. g. via Software & Updates → Updates); security should be enabled by default but it's better to check, especially if the package manager doesn't update Firefox yet.

Usually it's available within a few hours of Mozilla's announcement, sometimes faster, depending on the archive builders, and the speed of your local mirror, etc.

Solution 2:

A generic way to install Firefox

You can either go to Firefox page and download the latest.

Then you could create a directory where you're going to test this release of Firefox, unpack the downloaded package (I assume it is in your $HOME/Downloads folder) and launch it:

cd $HOME
mkdir Apps
cd Apps
tar jxf ~/Downloads/firefox-4.0b*.tar.bz2

To launch it, it's probably more interesting to create a "Launcher" (Gnome specific), an icon on your desktop to launch the beta. I guess there are similar steps for KDE. For this: