Hello, try installing from your package manager instead !

Hi MkII,

I do not have root on the machine.

What I need is a self-contained installation (equivalent to PortableApps on Windows).

Extract the tar.gz before running.

Hi MkII. Thank you for taking the time to help me.

I think we are past that point:

ll /tmp/firefox-portable/app

total 109728

drwxr-xr-x 6 user group 200 Jan 9 13:08 browser

drwxr-xr-x 3 user group 60 Jan 9 13:08 defaults

drwxr-xr-x 2 user group 80 Jan 9 13:08 dictionaries

drwxr-xr-x 2 user group 60 Jan 9 13:08 fonts

drwxr-xr-x 3 user group 60 Jan 9 13:08 gmp-clearkey

drwxr-xr-x 2 user group 60 Jan 9 13:08 gtk2

drwxr-xr-x 2 user group 60 Jan 9 13:08 icons

drwxr-xr-x 2 user group 40 Jan 9 13:08 plugins

-rw-r--r-- 1 user group 695 Jan 4 00:52 application.ini

-rw-r--r-- 1 user group 0 Jan 4 00:48 chrome.manifest

-rwxr-xr-x 1 user group 250448 Jan 4 01:23 crashreporter

-rw-r--r-- 1 user group 4003 Jan 4 00:16 crashreporter.ini

-rw-r--r-- 1 user group 157 Jan 4 01:23 dependentlibs.list

-rwxr-xr-x 1 user group 187536 Jan 4 01:23 firefox

-rwxr-xr-x 1 user group 187632 Jan 4 01:23 firefox-bin

-rw-r--r-- 1 user group 1449 Jan 4 01:29 firefox-bin.sig

-rw-r--r-- 1 user group 1449 Jan 4 01:29 firefox.sig

-rw-r--r-- 1 user group 10962944 Jan 4 00:16 icudt59l.dat

-rw-r--r-- 1 user group 899 Jan 4 01:23 libfreeblpriv3.chk

-rwxr-xr-x 1 user group 572016 Jan 4 01:23 libfreeblpriv3.so

-rwxr-xr-x 1 user group 59912 Jan 4 01:23 liblgpllibs.so

-rwxr-xr-x 1 user group 1548912 Jan 4 01:23 libmozavcodec.so

-rwxr-xr-x 1 user group 192176 Jan 4 01:23 libmozavutil.so

-rwxr-xr-x 1 user group 14528 Jan 4 01:23 libmozgtk.so

-rwxr-xr-x 1 user group 93208 Jan 4 01:23 libmozsandbox.so

-rwxr-xr-x 1 user group 1034000 Jan 4 01:23 libmozsqlite3.so

-rwxr-xr-x 1 user group 269592 Jan 4 01:23 libnspr4.so

-rwxr-xr-x 1 user group 689112 Jan 4 01:23 libnss3.so

-rwxr-xr-x 1 user group 534624 Jan 4 01:23 libnssckbi.so

-rw-r--r-- 1 user group 899 Jan 4 01:23 libnssdbm3.chk

-rwxr-xr-x 1 user group 158832 Jan 4 01:23 libnssdbm3.so

-rwxr-xr-x 1 user group 196384 Jan 4 01:23 libnssutil3.so

-rwxr-xr-x 1 user group 27168 Jan 4 01:23 libplc4.so

-rwxr-xr-x 1 user group 22944 Jan 4 01:23 libplds4.so

-rwxr-xr-x 1 user group 176984 Jan 4 01:23 libsmime3.so

-rw-r--r-- 1 user group 899 Jan 4 01:23 libsoftokn3.chk

-rwxr-xr-x 1 user group 266424 Jan 4 01:23 libsoftokn3.so

-rwxr-xr-x 1 user group 316184 Jan 4 01:23 libssl3.so

-rwxr-xr-x 1 user group 75579832 Jan 4 01:23 libxul.so

-rw-r--r-- 1 user group 1449 Jan 4 01:29 libxul.so.sig

-rwxr-xr-x 1 user group 860864 Jan 4 01:23 minidump-analyzer

-rw-r--r-- 1 user group 17306797 Jan 4 01:23 omni.ja

-rwxr-xr-x 1 user group 285944 Jan 4 01:23 pingsender

-rw-r--r-- 1 user group 166 Jan 4 01:23 platform.ini

-rwxr-xr-x 1 user group 179152 Jan 4 01:23 plugin-container

-rw-r--r-- 1 user group 1449 Jan 4 01:29 plugin-container.sig

-rw-r--r-- 1 user group 2591 Jan 4 01:29 precomplete

-rw-r--r-- 1 user group 707 Jan 4 00:48 removed-files

-rwxr-xr-x 1 user group 8915 Jan 4 00:16 run-mozilla.sh

-rw-r--r-- 1 user group 825 Jan 4 00:16 Throbber-small.gif

-rwxr-xr-x 1 user group 256672 Jan 4 01:23 updater

-rw-r--r-- 1 user group 681 Jan 4 01:23 updater.ini

-rw-r--r-- 1 user group 132 Jan 4 01:23 update-settings.ini

I take it you are trying to complicate things by doing something like in https://www.airaghi.net/en/2017/03/22/install-mozilla-firefox-portable-on-linux ?

The tar.bz2 from www.mozilla.org/firefox/all/ can be downloaded and used by a user with no su or root access.

Just make sure the extracted Firefox folder has read/write permissions so updates can install. A easy way if you are the only regular user is to put Firefox folder in Home.

https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/install-firefox-linux

If you want to have multiple builds of Firefox on Linux with each using a separate Profile then see http://kb.mozillazine.org/Shortcut_to_a_specific_profile and the examples works the same with a launcher shortcut on Linux.

Hi James,

Thanks for the answer, but no joy:

You correctly identified the instructions I was following. So I deleted all of it (including everything it created in /tmp and ~/.mozilla). Downloaded the tarball, unpacked it and run firefox.

1. Same error: "Your Firefox profile cannot be loaded. It may be missing or inaccessible"

2. The new firefox created a folder /tmp/firefox_shai, as well as ~/.mozilla folder. Don't know why.

3. Tried --profile <some_folder> and --ProfileManager. It ignored them all and repeated the error.