How to setup headless firefox browser Ubuntu Server

Question

I am trying to setup a headless firefox browser for my Ubuntu Server. I followed instructions on other posts but nothing seems to be working. I get this error when trying to startup firefox.

~(branch:master*) » firefox                                                                                                                                                                     jake@ubuntu
Error: no display specified
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~(branch:master*) » phpunit functional/SiteTest.php                                                                                                                                             jake@ubuntu
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~(branch:master*) » export DISPLAY=:10                                                                                                                                                          jake@ubuntu
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~(branch:master*) » firefox                                                                                                                                                                     jake@ubuntu
Error: cannot open display: :10

I am thinking it must be something with the display driver.

These are the instructions I am following.

http://www.installationpage.com/selenium/how-to-run-selenium-headless-firefox-in-ubuntu/

Let me know if you need more details.

How would I verify that? I'm not a server adamin I'm a programmer so details would be great. — Jacob Waller, Jun 30 '13 at 23:06
you can run `Xvfb :10 -screen 0 1024x768x16 &` which will run a virtual desktop on display 10. if it fails you will need to install some packages. You will need some sort of X server running. As your link suggests "Install Xvfb – the X Virtual FrameBuffer" — KeepCalmAndCarryOn, Jul 01 '13 at 01:28
Alright thanks I'll try that out and see if that works. Are you running selenium with php unit at all? — Jacob Waller, Jul 01 '13 at 03:18

warvariuc · Answer 1 · 2015-06-06T18:28:38.657

1

Install xvfb package:

sudo apt-get install xvfb

Then run firefox like this:

xvfb-run firefox

edited Jun 06 '15 at 18:28

answered Apr 19 '15 at 17:19

warvariuc

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score 0 · Answer 2 · answered Oct 17 '16 at 13:03

on a fresh Ubuntu 16.04.1, I installed firefox. This did not work with

Couldn't open libGL.so.1: libGL.so.1: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

I installdfed xvfb

sudo apt-get install xvfb

and started firefox

firefox

This worked. Be aware to ssh login with -X

ssh -X user@your_headless_box

and have something on your host that can display X applications. On Windows that would probably be Xming, on Mac XQuartz

How to setup headless firefox browser Ubuntu Server

2 Answers2