Hi Scott

You might find this article useful:

https://hacks.mozilla.org/2023/11/firefox-developer-edition-and-beta-try-out-mozillas-deb-package/

Currently this covers Beta and Dev Edition, but I understand that a Release version may follow soon. I used this process to add Developer Edition to Debian 12, seems to work perfectly fine.

If you install Firefox as root, then you can only update if you run Firefox as a root user (i.e. use sudo), otherwise you can install Firefox not in /opt but install in your home directory (~/firefox) and and update Firefox in the usual way via "Help -> About Firefox".

Yes the user needs read/write permissions for the Firefox folder in order to do internal Firefox updates.

If you are the only user then I also suggest to place the Firefox folder in /home directory to keep it simple.

Thanks for all the tips.

I tried to run the browser as root, but did not have permission? It was suggested that users in the wheel group might have better luck. I don't have a wheel group.

As I am not the only user, but am high chief, I changed ownership of the /opt/firefox directory structure to myself. Updated with no problems.

Everyone is happy.

Don't ever run a browser as root.

Installing the flatpak version would be preferable as you get protected binaries and sandboxing.