Mozilla Finally Launches An APT Repository For Easy Firefox Nightly Updating

[phoronix]

Phoronix: Mozilla Finally Launches An APT Repository For Easy Firefox Nightly Updating

While Mozilla has always produced Firefox Nightly builds for Linux as traditional binaries, they have finally decided to offer up an APT repository of Firefox Nightly builds to make it easy to stay up-to-date with new Firefox Nightly releases on Debian and Ubuntu Linux based distributions...

https://www.phoronix.com/news/Mozilla-APT-Firefox-Nightly

[Awesomeness]

They could achieve the same and be inclusive of more distributions by just going the Flatpak route instead of doing packaging work again and again. I thought they have financial difficulties, so not doing redundant work should be in their self-interest.

[LtdJorge]

They could achieve the same and be inclusive of more distributions by just going the Flatpak route instead of doing packaging work again and again. I thought they have financial difficulties, so not doing redundant work should be in their self-interest.

They have 0 financial difficulties. Mozilla Corp is thriving and they keep increasing execs' salaries. Don't let them fool you.

[cen1]

Good. Having an apt repo is always a bonus, I think I'll add it.

[ssokolow]

They could achieve the same and be inclusive of more distributions by just going the Flatpak route instead of doing packaging work again and again.

They already do. The Firefox Flatpak is one of the only packages on Flathub which is allowed to be built on the upstream's build infrastructure rather than Flathub's build farm. Mozilla is also officially responsible for the Firefox Snap as I remember.

(In other words, they consider it more important to make the friction for installing Firefox low than to save that effort... probably because they've already done most of the hard stuff as part of setting up the self-contained tarball builds that were originally all they offered.)

...and, honestly, I can see why. Given how I've seen people talking, I bet they're at least a bit worried about people who don't want to move off Ubuntu yet but hate Flatpak and Snap enough that they'd consider switching from Firefox to something Blink-based if the Blink-based alternative has a PPA.

[Awesomeness]

They already do. The Firefox Flatpak is one of the only packages on Flathub which is allowed to be built on the upstream's build infrastructure rather than Flathub's build farm. Mozilla is also officially responsible for the Firefox Snap as I remember.

I know that they already package Firefox for several packaging systems. That's what my comment about redundant work was all about.

[Awesomeness]

They have 0 financial difficulties. Mozilla Corp is thriving and they keep increasing execs' salaries. Don't let them fool you.

You don't know it but you're confirming my comment about wasteful financial behavior at Mozila.

[andyprough]

Brave has done this with all their release branches for years. Mozilla must finally be recognizing that they are losing substantial numbers of users to Brave. However, building an APT repo won't do anything to stem the loss of users, as all distros already had Firefox in their APT repos.

[M@GOid]

What I do is to drop the binary on my /Home and it works from there, self-updating and everything. That always comes to mind when someone argues about supporting some software for multiple Linux distros, like it was some sort of difficult dark magic.

Personally I would like more software, especially those outside of general public use, to just drop everything on /opt like Chrome and LibreOffice do, instead of creating some stupid installer or making you pursue some obscure dependencies while you compile it. Also, no more Flatpack or Snap crap. Throw everything in /opt, create a shortcut on /Desktop, and let the zealots preach the advantages of their pet app stores for themselves.

[uid313]

What I do is to drop the binary on my /Home and it works from there, self-updating and everything. That always comes to mind when someone argues about supporting some software for multiple Linux distros, like it was some sort of difficult dark magic.

Personally I would like more software, especially those outside of general public use, to just drop everything on /opt like Chrome and LibreOffice do, instead of creating some stupid installer or making you pursue some obscure dependencies while you compile it. Also, no more Flatpack or Snap crap. Throw everything in /opt, create a shortcut on /Desktop, and let the zealots preach the advantages of their pet app stores for themselves.

No thanks, I want Snap or Flatpak so the application can be sandboxed.
I am not a zealot for either of the packaging formats, so either Snap or Flatpak are fine as they're both sandboxed.