Re: Snatching defeat from the jaws of victory...
Last time I tried Linux and attempted to install Firefox I first had to find an installer for the distribution I was using. Then I had to decide from a swathe of nonsensical file types, gar, tar, bar har-de-har-har (with no explanation of what they meant or do). Finally I had to go through the rigmorole of 'unpacking' them, and typing a load of cryptic command to try try to complete the install.
obligatory Jobs paraphrased quote: You're installing it wrong.
Correct method would be to get familiar with the package repository manager you use and its frontend. If it's Debian based the package repository manager is called apt and there'll be a GUI frontend called Synaptic Package Manager. Ubuntu has its Software Centre. I'm not sure what it's called on Red Hat derived distributions other than it'll be based on yum.
You fire that up, look for Firefox, click install and it downloads and installs it for you. Not much different to the Apple App Store or the Google Play store, except that apt predates both of them by nearly a decade (late 90's versus 2006 for the iPhone).
Going to a supplier and obtaining a package manually is the old DOS-way of doing things that Windows inherited. It's not user friendly as you discovered, and haphazard installers mean the process is not guaranteed to be a smooth one.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
