Fire Starter

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Firestarter

1. Firestarter
1.1 Install Firestarter
1.2 Auto starting Firestarter
1.3 Network Manager Compatibility
1.4 Firestarter Menu Entries

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Firestarter

Firestarter is a desktop firewall aimed at Gnome desktops. Installing it is simple enough, but getting the GUI to start automatically requires some additional setup.

NOTE! After going through all this effort to get Firestarter integrated correctly with Gnome desktop I found it a PITA to have running on a daily basis and soon reverted to FireHOL. As from Ubuntu Hardy I now use ufw and gufw.

Install Firestarter

 sudo apt-get install firestarter

Auto starting Firestarter

Once Firestarter is installed, the firewall policy is enabled automatically at system boot, however the Firestarter GUI does not display itself by default. This is what we are fixing here.

Fixing Sudoers

First, we must configure your system so that it won't require root authentication when you launch Firestarter from your user login account. Run the following from a terminal...

 export EDITOR=gedit && sudo visudo

After entering this line, you'll be prompted for the root password. Enter the root password, then gedit should popup displaying the contents of the file located at /etc/sudoers .

Because of a bug, (see the references) Replace this line:

 Defaults !lecture,tty_tickets,!fqdn

with these four lines (the first 3 lines are intentionally commented out):

 # References
 #  - https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/firestarter/+bug/30291
 #  - https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/firestarter/+bug/47662
 #Defaults	!lecture,tty_tickets,!fqdn
 Defaults	!lecture,tty_tickets,!fqdn,env_keep+="DISPLAY HOME"

Also, add this line at the *very end* of the /etc/sudoers file:

 username ALL= NOPASSWD: /usr/sbin/firestarter

Replace "username" (above) with your login name. Now, save your changes and exit the gedit text editor.

Kill your sudo timestamp, therefore forcing re-authentication.

 sudo -K

Finally, you can test sudo it setup correctly by doing the following...

 sudo /usr/sbin/firestarter

Sessions

Go here to System -> Preferences -> Sessions

Create a new "StartUp Program", by clicking "Add", enter "Fire Starter" as the name, enter the following in the "command" textbox field...

 sudo /usr/sbin/firestarter --start-hidden

...and click OK.

Now Firestarter will appear on your system tray each time you login.

Minimise to tray

By default, each time you configure and close Firestarter, it will disappear from your system tray again. To prevent this undesirable default behavior, enable Firestarter's "Minimize to tray on window close" feature.

Open Firestarter from Ubuntu's Systems menu: System -> Administration -> Firestarter
Click the Preferences button and the make sure Interface is selected in the left pane.
Check the check box to the left of Minimize to tray on window close
Click the Accept button.

Network Manager Compatibility

Apparently there is a conflict between Firestarter and Network manager. The "fix" is to edit /etc/firestarter/firestarter.sh. You need to have actually run and configured Firestarted before /etc/firestarter/firestarter.sh is available.

 gksu gedit /etc/firestarter/firestarter.sh

Comment out :

 if [ "$MASK" = "" -a "$1" != "stop" ]; then
 echo "External network device $IF is not ready. Aborting.."
 exit 2
 fi

Like this:

 #if [ "$MASK" = "" -a "$1" != "stop" ]; then
 #echo "External network device $IF is not ready. Aborting.."
 #exit 2
 #fi

Save your changes and re-boot.

Firestarter Menu Entries

Finally, the Firestarter menu entries use "gksu" which for reason I don't understand will not launch Firestarter. Therefore "gksu" needs replacing with "sudo".

Right click on Applications and select Edit Menus
Double click on Applications -> Internet -> Firestarter

Change gksu, in the Command: field with sudo and click Close

Finally, after all that Firestarter is an entirely usable application ;-)

References

$Id: FireStarter,v 1.13 2008/07/03 21:20:15 martin Exp $

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