How to download a Web browser without having a working Web browser

So you're at another computer, and it has Internet access, but it doesn't have a functional Web browser. If the computer has problems and the only solution is to browse to a Web site and download a program, how do you do that? This most often happens on a PC running Microsoft Windows and having only Microsoft Internet Explorer installed.

You'll need an FTP client. Microsoft Windows comes with a simple command-line FTP client preinstalled. On other operating systems, you may have to install one. On Linux-based systems, it's usually installable from your distribution's repository.

Open a terminal window or command prompt window.

On Windows, you can press Windows+R on the keyboard and enter "cmd" as the name of the program to run.

Type the following commands in sequence.

ftp releases.mozilla.org
- anonymous
- \[Type your email address as the password]
cd pub
cd mozilla.org
cd firefox
cd releases
cd latest
cd win32
- On Linux, type "cd linux-i686" instead.
- On Mac OS, type "cd mac" instead.
cd en-US
binary
ls
- This shows a directory listing of the files in the directory you're in.
- On Windows, the file you're interested in is a .exe executable setup file named "Firefox Setup 3.6.13.exe" with the numbers replaced by the actual latest version. Note the spaces and capitalization.
- On Linux, the file you're interested in is a .tar.bz2 BZipped tarball file named "firefox-3.6.13.tar.bz2" with the numbers (except bz2) replaced by the actual latest version.
- On Mac OS, the file you're interested in is a .dmg disk image file named "Firefox 3.6.13.dmg" with the numbers replaced by the actual latest version.
get "Firefox Setup 3.6.13.exe"
- Type the quotes literally.
- Replace the filename with the actual filename given by the "ls" command earlier, based on your OS and the actual latest version.
bye

The file will be downloaded in Step 11 to your current working directory. On Windows, that's either "C:\Documents and Settings\[your user name]\" or "C:\Users\[your user name]\" by default. On Linux and Mac OS, that's your home directory by default.

You can now run, untar, or open the file to install Firefox, and it shouldn't depend on the system's default Web browser being functional in order to do it.