Linux PDF Issues

Firefox failed to load a PDF I typed into the address bar.

After a bit of trial and error, I discovered the PDF Download add-on, which makes it all simpler when one clicks a link.

I first downloaded FoxIt PDF reader for Linux (binary) and told Firefox to use that to open PDFs. Unfortunately, it opens the ReaderLinux binary, not the PDF. And once I associated the file type with the binary, the Linux Firefox fails to provide an easy way to disassociate itself from that.

The solution: edit file ~/.mozilla/firefox/profile.default/mimeTypes.rdf, and delete the XML sections dealing with ReaderLinux. Restart Firefox. The next time you attempt to open a PDF, Firefox will prompt the user again for what to do.

The final solution? Associating Okular (/usr/lib/kde4/bin/okular) with PDF file types instead works great. And PDF Download add-on works great too.