Linux for beginners

Discussion in 'all things UNIX' started by Krusty, Jul 2, 2016.

  1. summerheat

    summerheat Registered Member

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    Welcome to Linux, @Krusty :)

    My opinion is: Use only the AppArmor profiles which are enabled by default - and the Firefox profile doesn't belong to them. I recommend to rather sandbox, e.g., Firefox and Chrome by using Firejail. It provides a very tough sandbox and is considerably less troublesome than AppArmor - particularly for newbies. Besides, using AppArmor and Firejail alongside for the same applications can be difficult at times.

    Install Firejail from the repositiories and execute the two commands shown here. The second command takes care that all installed applications for which profiles are available will be sandboxed by Firejail . You can find more information on the Firejail homepage, particularly here. If you have any questions you can ask in the Firejail thread in this forum.
     
  2. Krusty

    Krusty Registered Member

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    Thank you @summerheat ,

    I will look into Firejail again later today but what I seen the other day made me think it was complicated. I'll check out your links too.

    Thanks again.
     
  3. Krusty

    Krusty Registered Member

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    Another question - when or if I minimise Firefox, how do I maximise it again? In Windows I can just click the icon on the Task Bar, but doing similar in Linux (click the icon on the Panel) starts a whole new Firefox session. There's no right-click option to maximise it either.

    Thanks.
     
  4. Krusty

    Krusty Registered Member

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    Ah ha. https://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?t=111790

     
  5. Krusty

    Krusty Registered Member

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    Please bear with me. I've installed Firejail. Specifically, which two commands?
     
  6. Krusty

    Krusty Registered Member

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    I entered:
    Code:
    firecfg --fix-sound
    Was asked to sign out and back in. Did that.

    Entered:
    Code:
    sudo firecfg
    Now Firefox won't open.

    Screenshot at 2019-04-12 10-40-57.png

    Help please.
     
  7. summerheat

    summerheat Registered Member

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    Ah - yes! You're using Linux Mint, and on Debian/Ubuntu-based distros there is a separate firejail-profiles package which must be installed as well. I guess you didn't do that. So please install it and repeat those 2 commands again. I hope that helps.

    I suggest that further Firejail-related questions should be discussed in the related thread.
     
  8. Krusty

    Krusty Registered Member

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    Well, that got me a lot further, but now Firefox opens to a blank page.
     
  9. summerheat

    summerheat Registered Member

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    That should not be related to Firejail. Can you surf with Firefox as ususal?
     
  10. Krusty

    Krusty Registered Member

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    Nope. Just a white blank page.
     
  11. summerheat

    summerheat Registered Member

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    Weird. Did you try to logoff and logon again?

    EDIT: Sorry - I hadn't seen your post in the other thread.
     
  12. Krusty

    Krusty Registered Member

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    And now the Software Updater can't connect. "Could not refresh the list of updates". Firefox is default browser.
     
  13. Krusty

    Krusty Registered Member

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    Yep, same result.

    Edit:

    Screenshot at 2019-04-12 20-22-06.png
     
  14. Krusty

    Krusty Registered Member

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    At this point I'm almost tempted to uninstall Firejail and undo its changes. Is there an easy way to do that without restoring a Snapshot?
     
  15. summerheat

    summerheat Registered Member

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    Again, this is very weird and should not be related to Firejail. Did you try to reboot your system?
     
  16. Krusty

    Krusty Registered Member

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    I just used a command you posted in that other thread:
    Code:
    sudo firecfg --clean
    Firefox is working again.

    Update Manager still fails.
     
  17. Krusty

    Krusty Registered Member

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    Well, Mint ended up being a failed experiment once again. I can no longer use the Update Manager, even after restoring a System Snapshot. Thanks Firejail!

    This was supposed to be a fun experiment, not an another PITA headache. If I wanted that I would have , and now probably will return to Windows.

    I thank those that have helped me with Linux but I don't have the patience to troubleshoot issues that weren't affecting me before I installed Firejail.
     
    Last edited: Apr 12, 2019
  18. summerheat

    summerheat Registered Member

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    I'm sorry to read that , and I can understand your frustration. However, I still cannot see why Firejail should be responsible for your problems as it does not affect any update managers and doesn't alter any network or repository settings so there must be another reason. Did you try again after a reboot?

    Regarding Firefox, I'm also puzzled how that can happen. I've never seen that before. Did you update your system before installing it? Which version was installed?
     
  19. Krusty

    Krusty Registered Member

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    I'm sorry to say that the machine was running flawlessly until I installed Firejail.

    Firefox was updated to 66.0.2 before the install. The Software Updater worked fine too but would not after Firejail was installed.

    My search engine finds many results with Firefox + Firejail, but I honestly never looked for issues with the Software Updater. I'd had enough by then.
     
  20. sbwhiteman

    sbwhiteman Registered Member

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    How about reverting to a Timeshift restore point before the trouble started?
     
  21. Stefan Froberg

    Stefan Froberg Registered Member

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    Um...... wouldn't it be better instead of enabling FireJail for all applications by default (firecfg command) to just
    try first what works and what not with simply typing firejail <program> ?

    Like:

    firejail firefox

    ?

    After all, if AppArmor is on by default (like the similar kernel level protection, SELinux is in Fedora) and then you also
    enable all the software and services in your system to use FireJail, I would expect things to start breaking ....

    After all, there is no hurry to dive into advanced and complicated security hardening by enabling all the stuff on right away.
     
  22. XenMan

    XenMan Registered Member

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    Don't give up!! A good intro to Linux is in a VM so you can explore, learn and make mistakes without consequence. I use a 'rolling' VM and create a new snapshot regularly and delete all the old ones so it doesn't take up too much space.
     
  23. Daveski17

    Daveski17 Registered Member

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    Is Firejail really that necessary on Linux?
     
  24. XenMan

    XenMan Registered Member

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    Do you need a big fence, around a moat, around a bunker, with a secure room? Answers will vary.
     
  25. Daveski17

    Daveski17 Registered Member

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    Good answer. lol
     
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