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NOTE: The nightly build system has been changed a bit to work with datetimes in the filenames, so the following blog post is a re-hash with updates about how to get on our nightly build train.

Thanks to the complexity of a project like Mobile Firefox/Fennec where there are multiple releases across multiple devices that essentially have their own branch, confusion with versioning will occur at odd times (i.e. when your code is between a RC2 and RC3). That’s certainly a problem because my e-mail inbox gets filled with people who want to try the close-to-be-released piece of software. They become confused, ansy and/or angry about why they can’t install the right builds. So, I’m here to alleviate and educate a bit for those people. Here’s a big blog post about the two ways to get the latest Mobile Firefox/Fennec Nightly Builds for Maemo-based devices.

If you don’t have one, then please disregard this post and go on with your hopefully merry day.

– Automatic Update Installation –

1. Open the built-in browser
2. Download and add one of the repos in http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/mobile/repos/trunk_multi/ to your Application Manager.
3. In the Application Manager, Click on “Downloads” and wait for the Fennec entry to come up.
4. Install Fennec

This will load application catalog for the latest multi-locale trunk build of Mobile Firefox/Fennec and update your device daily with notifications (yellow-blinking sign next to your battery life indicator). If you would like to get a release that’s currently in development, you can also go back to http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/mobile/repos and click on VERSION_multi folder (i.e. 1.9.2_multi) and load the .install file in that folder at any time. If you do this, remember that you’ll stay on that branch and not be updated with the nightly builds of the next release that’s in development (i.e. 1.9.3).

– Manual Installation –

If automatic updates are not your style, you can also download and install .deb files of the latest nightly build as well. To do this, you’ll need to do the following:

1. Download the latest fennec .deb file from this link: http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/mobile/nightly/latest-mobile-trunk/
2. Open the File Manager and go to the “Documents” folder
3. Open the downloaded .deb file with the App Manager
4. Install Fennec

Just like automatic updates, can you get the latest nightly build for the current release in development manually as well. Simply repeat steps 3-4 using the following link: http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/firefox/nightly/latest-mobile-1.9.2/

For those that have used a version of Mobile Firefox/Fennec older than Mobile Firefox 1.0 Maemo RC1 and have not cleared their profiles since then, please clear it out and uninstall your current version of Mobile Firefox/Fennec. The following steps will guide you in order to do this:

– Clear Your Profile –

1. Open up “xterm” which will be in the “more” section of the application menu.
2. Enter in the command “cd ~/.mozilla/” (Note: To enter the “~” character, press the blue arrow that points to the top right with the Sym/Ctrl button to open the character map for the device. In there, select the “~” key and press the space bar)
3. Enter in “rm -r fennec” which will delete your profile folder.

– Uninstall –

1. Open “App Manager” which will be in the “more” section of the application menu.
2. Click “Uninstall”
3. Remove “Fennec”
4. Click on the title of the App Manager window, which will open a menu, and select Catalogs. If you have any catalogs with “Mozilla” in the title, click on them and click “Delete” to remove them.

I hope this was helpful!