Installing Pale Moon on Linux

Unread post by **trava90** » 2014-01-31, 20:24

Hello, I have been a user of Pale Moon on Windows for several years, but have recently switched to Linux completely. I am trying to install the 24.3.1 version from the PM4Linux SourceFourge site, but can't get it to run. I followed the installation instruction on the SF PM4Linux Wiki, and didn't get any error messages, but whenever I select Pale Moon from the menu, nothing happens. Here is a Terminal output when I try to run it from the terminal:

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[travis@laptop ~]$ palemoon
/usr/bin/palemoon: line 2: /opt/palemoon/: Is a directory
/usr/bin/palemoon: line 2: exec: /opt/palemoon/: cannot execute: Is a directory
[travis@Fedora-laptop ~]$

I am running Fedora 20 x64 with Linux Kernel 3.12.8 Any help would be appreciated. I would love to have my Pale Moon back on my Linux computer!

jumba · Unread post by **jumba** » 2014-02-01, 09:53

Somewhat related questions, what is the difference between /opt/palemoon/palemoon and /opt/palemoon/palemoon-bin?

And instead of creating a shell script to launch the pm executable I created a symbolic link to the executable and placed it in /usr/bin. Which is a better solution or are both equivalent?

This was the command I used, note the palemoon-bin is used

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 sudo ln -s /opt/palemoon/palemoon-bin /usr/bin/palemoon

access2godzilla · Unread post by **access2godzilla** » 2014-02-01, 12:19

My bad, posted wrong instructions

(Note: I removed my earlier post). I completely forgot that the archive already has all its files in "palemoon" directory, so the executable ended up going into /opt/palemoon/palemoon/palemoon! I've updated the wiki with (hopefully) correct instructions.

@jumba: palemoon and palemoon-bin are bit for bit identical. There's no difference now, although there was in previous Mozilla products, where $foo was a wrapper shell script which handled calls to $foo-bin, which was the actual program. This is probably still kept for legacy reasons.

@trava90, please run the following:

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rm -r /opt/palemoon

and then run the updated instructions in the wiki.

jlost · Unread post by **jlost** » 2014-02-01, 20:36

Followed the updated wiki instructions and cannot launch PM4Linux. Running Linux-Lite (Ubuntu) x86 (3.8 Kernel) on i5 laptop.

$ sudo palemoon
/usr/bin/palemoon: 1: /usr/bin/palemoon: Syntax error: ")" unexpected

Unread post by **trava90** » 2014-02-02, 00:00

Thanks a2g! Working great! Posting this using my new Pale Moon for Linux! I've installed PM on both my Fedora box as well as my wife's Mint box, and there is a noticeable improvement in performance over Firefox that is installed on both systems. Great work Moonchild for an amazing browser and access2godzilla for bringing it to Linux!
I do have another question, however: on my wife's Linux Mint computer, after installation, PM had all the plugins and add-ons installed that FF had, however on my Fedora system, no add-ons or plugins are installed. How should I go about installing them?

access2godzilla · Unread post by **access2godzilla** » 2014-02-02, 08:51

@jlost, are you following the (updated) instructions in the wiki?

@trava90, you can back up your extensions and themes by installing FEBE in Firefox, and then install them in Pale Moon. (Don't back up the preferences though.) As for the plugins, get them from the repos and install them, that is easy enough.

jlost · Unread post by **jlost** » 2014-02-02, 11:27

@access2godzilla, apologies. I didn't realise I needed to use the i686 version. Something else I've noticed is that root is required to launch. You don't mention anything related to permissions in the wiki.

access2godzilla · Unread post by **access2godzilla** » 2014-02-02, 11:58

jlost wrote:root is required to launch.

No, root is not required to launch Pale Moon. In fact, doing that is a very dangerous practice.
If you run "/usr/bin/palemoon" or "/opt/palemoon/palemoon" in a terminal (without the quotes), what happens?

jlost · Unread post by **jlost** » 2014-02-02, 12:32

$ /opt/palemoon/palemoon
Error: Access was denied while trying to open files in your profile directory.

Popup: Profile Missing. Your Pale Moon profile cannot be loaded. It may be missing or inaccessible.

$ sudo /opt/palemoon/palemoon - works.

access2godzilla · Unread post by **access2godzilla** » 2014-02-02, 13:11

When you first launched PM, you launched it as root, didn't you? Well, that's the problem: now PM's profile has been owned by root, and it's inaccessible by a non-root user. Run the following in a terminal window:

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sudo chown -hR <username>:<group> "~/.moonchild productions"

(Generally, the <group> on most systems is the same as <username>.)

This will make you the owner of your own profile. Now you should be able to run PM without root.

And please don't run any program, like a browser as root - it's dangerous. If you somehow land on a page with a 0-day, you're literally pwned.

jlost · Unread post by **jlost** » 2014-02-02, 13:26

I don't believe I did first launch using root. I changed the permission of the profile folder, but the same error occurs. I removed "/opt/palemoon/," ".moonchild productions" and the shortcut "/usr/bin/palemoon," and installed again. First launch using "/opt/palemoon/palemoon" produces the same error. This is a fresh install of Linux Lite so I don't think I have done anything that could be causing this but it's probably not out of the question. I haven't had a problem with any other app.

If it's of any help, here are the groups for the username:

$ groups fug
fug : fug adm cdrom sudo dip plugdev lpadmin sambashare

EDIT: There do appear to be some issues with this Linux Lite install. I'm going to do a fresh install and try PM4Linux then.

access2godzilla · Unread post by **access2godzilla** » 2014-02-02, 14:15

Before you make a reinstall, maybe you could post the output of

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sudo ls -la ~

What happens if you extract the PM4Linux archive somewhere else (say, your home directory) and run it from there?

jlost · Unread post by **jlost** » 2014-02-02, 14:48

"sudo ls -la ~" output:

Running from 'home' produces the same error, with and without '.moonchild productions' being removed. FYI, Firefox is working fine with this user. Could the space in the folder name be the cause?

EDIT: I notice the actual profile folder "/.moonchild productions/pale moon/qozkzg5g.default" requires root to access.

$ sudo ls -la "pale moon"
total 16
drwx------ 3 fug fug 4096 Feb 2 15:05 .
drwx------ 3 fug fug 4096 Feb 2 14:46 ..
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 94 Feb 2 15:05 profiles.ini
drwx------ 6 root root 4096 Feb 2 15:09 qozkzg5g.default

EDIT2: Nevermind, I just remembered that happens because of first launch using root.

Unread post by **Night Wing** » 2014-02-02, 15:30

Since I'm a linux newbie (which is closer to being linux illiterate) and after reading some of the minor problems the power users are having installing/using Pale Moon for linux, instead of me trying to make a menu entry and a launcher, I didn't install Pale Moon 64-bit in my in ubuntu based Linux Mint 16 (Petra) 64-bit operating system. I'm just running it from the executable file.

I'm doing it this way since for me, the terminal is definitely my enemy. BTW, everything is working great for me. The 64-bit linux version of Pale Moon plays both video and audio in YouTube. My NoSquint extension works too.

On my other desktop computer, one of my hard drives is running debian based SolydX 64-bit. Since SolydX is debian based, I'm a little apprehensive on deciding whether or not to run 64-bit Pale Moon in SolydX. Maybe a small jigger of George Dickel #8 Tennessee whisky in a 12 ounce glass of Coca-Cola will give me the courage to do so later on.

Anyway, I just want to give a public......"Thank You"......to Access2Godzilla for building Pale Moon (32-bit & 64-bit) versions for linux and also to Moonchild for giving his help to A2G in this build project. At least I won't have to dread the oncoming Australis UI which is coming in linux Firefox. I just don't like installing more and more add-ons to make Firefox (my backup browser) look like the old classic Firefox pre-Australis. I'm always leery of lots of add-ons breaking other things and/or some of them just being abandoned by their authors.

Again, thanks to Access2Gozilla and Moonchild for their time and effort since this PM linux build has been months in the making. It's much appreciated by me.

Nigaikaze · Unread post by **Nigaikaze** » 2014-02-02, 22:21

@Access2Godzilla, thank you SO much for your work in getting Pale Moon running on Linux! I'm a long time Pale Moon user on Windows (and long time lurker here), but I had to register to say thanks!

@ Night Wing,

Since SolydX is debian based, I'm a little apprehensive on deciding whether or not to run 64-bit Pale Moon in SolydX.

I have Pale Moon running on a 64-bit installation of SolydK, and it's working fine. I use SolydK more than SolydX, but from what I've seen of SolydX it should also work fine on that system.

Unread post by **Night Wing** » 2014-02-03, 01:50

Nigaikaze wrote:@ Night Wing,

I have Pale Moon running on a 64-bit installation of SolydK, and it's working fine. I use SolydK more than SolydX, but from what I've seen of SolydX it should also work fine on that system.

I know Pale Moon linux works in debian based SolydX&K. It's the user (me) who isn't comfortable using the linux Terminal to install Pale Moon in SolydX.

I have four computers (2 desktops, 2 laptops). I've got one laptop with two hard drives for it. I've got ubuntu based Linux Mint 16 (XFCE) on one hard drive and I'll try to install linux Pale Moon using the Terminal so Pale Moon shows up in the Internet heading and if so, then I'll be able to create a launcher for Pale Moon in the Taskbar.

If I can do that, then I "might" try to install linux Pale Moon in debian based SolydX.

access2godzilla · Unread post by **access2godzilla** » 2014-02-03, 08:26

Night Wing wrote:It's the user (me) who isn't comfortable using the linux Terminal to install Pale Moon in SolydX.

I posted command line based instructions in the wiki since they work for everyone, regardless of distro or environment. However, the layman's description is also posted at the top of each command, so you can do them even with the GUI.

If you need any help or clarification you can as always ask here; however, is copy-pasting commands into a terminal window a very difficult job to accomplish?

Unread post by **Night Wing** » 2014-02-03, 14:26

access2godzilla wrote:However, the layman's description is also posted at the top of each command, so you can do them even with the GUI.

If you need any help or clarification you can as always ask here; however, is copy-pasting commands into a terminal window a very difficult job to accomplish?

What's easy for you is not easy for me. To wit, I don't understand/comprehend the layman's description. I'm used to Windows, not linux. But, even in Windows, I've never used the command line in the Terminal. So the linux Terminal is a nightmare for me.

As an example. To install Linux Mint, the Mint installer automatically partitions the drive for a person like me. But, in SolydX, the drive has to be partitioned manually. Since I didn't understand/comprehend the layman's description to install SoldyX, I had to go to YouTube where I could actually "see" how to install SolydX in a video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=djfJ5kTIdN0

The first 2 minutes and 13 seconds of that video, I had to pause it many times and write down on a piece of paper what he was doing with every cursor move. In the end, it's 29 steps for me. Of course, he used a 20 GB partition, but I had to partition my hard drive which is 1 TB which took me more time to figure out the size of the partitions for "swap, grub, ext4" on my hard drive. So that 2 minutes and 13 seconds for him, took me 1 1/2 hours to install SolydX. But, I did get it done and I've still got my 29 step cheat sheet to install SolydX.

As for the instructions where I said, I don't understand the layman's description, this is what I mean:

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Make a menu entry by creating /usr/share/applications/palemoon.desktop with the following contents:

[Desktop Entry]
Version=1.0
Name=Pale Moon Web Browser
Comment=Browse the World Wide Web
Keywords=Internet;WWW;Browser;Web;Explorer
Exec=palemoon %u
Terminal=false
X-MultipleArgs=false
Type=Application
Icon=/opt/palemoon/browser/icons/mozicon128.png
Categories=Network;WebBrowser;Internet
MimeType=text/html;text/xml;application/xhtml+xml;application/xml;application/rss+xml;application/rdf+xml;image/gif;image/jpeg;image/png;x-scheme-handler/http;x-scheme-handler/https;x-scheme-handler/ftp;x-scheme-handler/chrome;video/webm;application/x-xpinstall;

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

It's the........../usr/share/applications/palemoon.desktop.......is where I get lost. I assume this makes a folder someplace. Creating the folder is the problem for me. In my mind, it seems I have to put the............/usr/share/applications/palemoon.desktop.............commands into the Terminal to make the folder and then use the Terminal again to drop the "Menu Entry and all the things underneath it" into it. I'm guessing my assumption is not correct. Then I assume it has to be saved, but how do I save it (if my assumption is correct)?

For a power user, the layman's description is simple, but for a linux illiterate like me, it's frustration because I'm not sure of anything I'm doing is correct. And believe me, I've messed up the Mint distro so bad using the Terminal for other things, I've had to re-install the Mint distro..........twice just to make Mint useable again.

As for tarballs, I'm used to downloading the tarball, right clicking on the tarball and use the "Extract here" prompt to get the file out of the tarball. After that, I'm stuck because most tarballs don't have the executable file in them. The linux Firefox ESR tarball is a case in point since it doesn't contain the executable file in it. This is why I was never able to install the linux Firefox ESR browser in Mint. I got lost in the linux Terminal trying to install it. The tarball you made for linux Pale Moon does contain the executalbe file and I thank you for that.

This is one thing I'm sure of. If these layman's instructions were done in a YouTube video, I'd have no problems because I'm visually oriented instead of instructionally oriented.

In then end, I'm glad you put the executable file in the tarball. It allows me to run linux Pale Moon by the use of the executable file so I'm not too disappointed I can't make a menu item under Internet in the main Mint applications menu which prevents me from making a Pale Moon launcher on the Taskbar.

jlost · Unread post by **jlost** » 2014-02-03, 23:25

@access2godzilla, just to update; fresh Linux Lite install solved the problem. Palemoon up and running perfectly now. Thanks.

access2godzilla · Unread post by **access2godzilla** » 2014-02-04, 03:34

@jlost, you could easily fix that by the chown command I posted earlier. No reinstall needed.

@Night Wing, I don't know what text editor you have; assuming it's gedit, you type:

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gedit /usr/share/applications/palemoon.desktop

and put in the desktop entry stuff there and save it.

You also need to run the update-alternatives commands; don't worry about the score.

And as for Firefox not having the executable, seems like you downloaded the Firefox source code!

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