Mozilla Firefox

Firefox
Icon:
Maintained by:	Peter Naulls
Description:	This is a port of the Firefox web browser for RISC OS.
OS Restrictions:	Not RISC PC or earlier
Languages:	English
Alternatives:	NetSurf, Oregano
Website:	http://www.riscos.info/unix/firefox/

Versions

Currently, versions 1.5 and 2 have been released – further development is dependent on ongoing financial contributions.

Firefox can be downloaded from the Firefox port page.

Mozilla Firefox 2 Downloads

• Firefox 2 for RISC OS Release 2. For IYONIX pc, A9home, Omega. This will not work on RiscPCs. It may work on VirtualRPC.
• Firefox 2 for RISC OS Release 1. For IYONIX pc only.

Previous releases

Version 1.5 releases for all RISC OS machines (RISC OS 4 onwards) are still available, however there may be stability issues on some machines. Most users will find performance unacceptably slow on sub-300MHz machines.

Installing and using Firefox 2

Some users may experience difficulty in running Firefox for the first time, so here is a quick guide to get you going.

First make sure you have downloaded all the necessary parts. As well as the Firefox application you will also need:

• Tinct – A module that provides applications with support for high speed sprite plotting and image enhancement
• SharedUnixLibrary – A library of files required by many applications originating on the Unix platform
• ELFLoader – An object loader for elves

Setting up Choices

After checking you have all the necessary modules in the right place (ELFLoader can be put in <Choices$Write>.Boot.Predesk) you'll need to set up the Choices file for Firefox, as the current application fails to do this correctly (version 2r2):

1. Press CTRL+F12 to bring up a taskwindow.
2. Enter the following: Filer_OpenDir <Choices$Write>
3. In the window that appears, look for a directory called Mozilla. If it isn't there, create it.
4. Open the Mozilla directory.
5. Create a sub-directory called Default in the Mozilla directory.
6. Load your favourite Text Editor.
7. Enter the following text exactly as shown:
   [General]
StartWithLastProfile=1
[Profile0]
Name=default
IsRelative=1
Path=Default
8. Save the file as profiles/ini inside the Mozilla directory.
9. Run Firefox2 for the first time!

Building Firefox from source

The best place to start is building Firefox 1.5, whose patches are already integrated in the GCCSDK autobuilder. The differences between Firefox 1.5 and Firefox 2 are mostly upstream changes. You'll need access to a Unix machine (or possibly Windows, though this is less well tested) since the build process makes use of tools which aren't available on RISC OS.

To begin, follow the Using GCCSDK tutorial.