Firefox

Firefox
MozillaFirefox
Free and open source web browser that implements current and anticipated web standards
Developer:
Mozilla Foundation, Mozilla Corporation and other contributors
License:
MPLv2
Website:
http://www.firefox.com/

Mozilla Firefox is a standalone web browser, designed for privacy, security, standards compliance and performance. Its functionality can be enhanced via a plethora of extensions.

Firefox makes your daily web browsing fun and easy with a number of features, including:

Tabbed browsing
Private browsing including do-not-track enabled by default
Advanced phishing and malware protection
Spell checking
Incremental find within pages
Smart Bookmarks
Download manager
Location-aware browsing
Compliant with modern web standards
Modern web development tools
Available in a wide number of locales
A thriving ecosystem of themes and extensions at https://addons.mozilla.org

Installation

In all openSUSE desktop installation, Firefox is installed by default. So usually you don't need to install it manually.

(Click the button to install)

Via GNOME Software

Start Software. Search for package "MozillaFirefox". Click the ideal package to open detail page. Click Install button.

Via KDE Discover

Start Discover. Search for package "MozillaFirefox". Click the ideal package to open detail page. Click Install button.

Via YaST

Start YaST --> Software Management. Search for package "MozillaFirefox". Check the checkbox for installation (green check). Click Accept button to start installation.

Via Zypper

sudo zypper in MozillaFirefox

Configuration

Don't trust extensions

Be Careful!

Mozilla is NOT responsible for security auditing of extensions at https://addons.mozilla.org which gives malware chances. Even some "featured" extensions are proven to be malware. You should not install extensions or themes without knowing who the author is and whether the code has been hijacked. And Mozilla will never tell you this!

Some famous examples:

The following guidelines can keep you away from bad extensions:

The extension must only come from https://addons.mozilla.org
The extension must be "recommended" by Mozilla, which means it has been audited for security and privacy by Mozilla engineers. Note: not all of them are open source.
The extension must be open source and you can get the source code on GitHub or somewhere else. For example, uBlock Origin has its source code on GitHub and it is actively developed by many contributors. This makes sure enough people are watching it for you.
The extension must have a long enough history and large enough user base. Never install an extension that is uploaded just one month ago.
The extension must be developed by trusted individuals or organizations. For example, extensions from Mozilla and EFF can be trusted.
Be careful with "free" services. Most of them are selling only one product: your data.

Adblock and privacy extensions

Extensions for everyone, no mandatory configuration needed:

Facebook Container by Mozilla (built in), GitHub
uBlock Origin by Raymond Hill, GitHub
HTTPS Everywhere by EFF, GitHub
Privacy Badger by EFF, GitHub
Decentraleyes by Thomas Rientjes, GitLab

Do NOT install multiple ad blockers because they conflict with each other and make ad blocking effect worse. If you already installed uBlock Origin, then don't install Adblock Plus.

Extensions for experts, with total control:

NoScript by Giorgio Maone, GitHub
Cookie AutoDelete by CAD Team, GitHub

Even with protection of extensions, you can still be tracked and identified by IP address or your browser fingerprint. If you want to hide your identity better, use Tor Browser instead.

Latest version

The Mozilla Project on the Build Service provides you the latest version of Firefox. This project offers relatively stable and tested, albeit unofficial, packages from Mozilla.

The repository can be found in the Mozilla repository.

While using the latest Firefox release, you can install Firefox ESR for tests/comparison. It is available with Mozilla repository.

Tips and tricks

Speedup

Check Firefox state with 'about:support' page, change settings with 'about:config' page. Restart Firefox to use new settings.
Use 64-bit OS and applications. 32-bit x86 systems have different restrictions.
Use the latest Firefox release with additional settings.
Usage of newer Firefox features implies usage of newer video drivers. For openSUSE Leap that means getting Mesa 3D from X11:XOrg repository instead of default one. For AMD GCN1 & GCN2 you may want to use amdgpu kernel driver (and Vulkan drivers) instead of radeon.
Use hardware-accelerated Webrender compositing, not software variant. It requires Direct3D 10.0 for Windows, which corresponds to OpenGL 3.0 on Linux (not just OpenGL ES 3.0). Use OpenGL 3.1 for compositing in KDE. Cheap solution: Mesa 3D provides OpenGL 3.3+ for ATI/AMD Radeon HD 2000+ cards. Modern built-in graphics (Intel or AMD) is also OK.
Supposedly you need 256 MiB or more video RAM for hardware GPU acceleration. Minimal settings for built-in graphics, such as 64 MiB, may cause troubles.
OpenGL compositing (required OpenGL 1.x, parameter layers.acceleration.force-enabled) was available on Linux, was dropped since Firefox 93, despite being faster on older machines.
You need 3 or more CPU hardware threads (cores, visible by OS) to use OMT (off-main-thread) painting/compositing. New CPUs with only 2 hardware cores and threads: Intel Celeron, AMD A6 APU (socket AM4, Bristol Ridge family). New Celeron CPUs are renamed to 'Intel Processor'. AMD Athlon for AM4 and modern Intel Pentium have 2 cores and 4 threads with enabled HT.
You may get some speedup with using Vulkan 1.2+ with skia library.
SDB:Clean Firefox Database This works only from Firefox 3.0 on.
Disable IPv6
Extremely slow startup? YaST Network Settings -> Hostname/DNS tab -> Assign Hostname to Loopback IP

Reduce Disk Writes

Increase browser.sessionstore.interval in about:config

Privacy

A list of features that actively leak data to third-party services

Miscellaneous

Netflix

To force 1080p playback, one can install the Netflix 1080p add-on
To check video resolution, one can press Ctrl+Alt+Shift+D

Fonts in Flatpak version

There is an open bug regarding fonts displayed in the Flatpak version of Firefox where certain websites' fonts are in serif.

A possible workaround is to add the following code to ~/.var/app/org.mozilla.firefox/config/fontconfig/fonts.conf.

<?xml version='1.0'?>
<!DOCTYPE fontconfig SYSTEM 'fonts.dtd'>
<fontconfig>
    <!-- Disable bitmap fonts. -->
    <selectfont><rejectfont><pattern>
        <patelt name="scalable"><bool>false</bool></patelt>
    </pattern></rejectfont></selectfont>
</fontconfig>

External links

http://www.mozilla.org/firefox