Ubuntu – How to launch Tor from the command line

14.04browsercommand linegnome-terminaltor-browser

I downloaded the Tor Browser DEB file from the official website and installed it – it works fine when I search for it in the dash and click on the icon, but I use the terminal a lot and would like to know how to launch it from the terminal. I've tried tor-browser and numerous variations of that with no success. I can't find anything useful online. I want to launch tor-browser from the terminal. It is already downloaded and installed. I do not want tor.

Best Answer

As @bodhi.zazen said in the comments, the tor command is working fine; it's just that Tor is already running. If you read the output from the tor command, you'll see that this is indeed the case.

This is similar to how you can't have to instances of Audacity running at the same time.

If the tor command were really not working, you'd get this output:

user@ubuntu:~$ tor
The program 'tor' is currently not installed. You can install it by typing:
sudo apt-get install tor

Related Solutions

Ubuntu – How to update Tor browser

How to update?

Just download the latest version from their website.

How to run it?

After unzip the file:

Grant execute privileges to the start-tor-browser file:
```
chmod +x start-tor-browser
```
Double click the file
If you get a message, click on Run

That is all

Ubuntu – Tor command is not starting Tor Browser

The Tor Browser bundle and the Tor Daemon are different beasts, and there's some confusion what does what. The fact that 'tor' isn't familiar to you means you should probably be looking into what different commands do before trying to alias things together. (For example, tor is an actual program - using that to call the Tor Browser is not the correct approach)

Tor Browser

Tor Browser is a software bundle which comes with its own Tor daemon that is launched by the "Start Tor Browser" script. This software bundle includes a fork of Firefox which is bundled with plugins that are specific to Tor Browser, to make it function effectively on the Tor network.

Tor Browser is only run usually with the ./start-tor-browser.desktop launcher, or the ./start-tor-browser shell script/function which executes everything that needs to run for Tor Browser to work.

This is its own software bundle, and is different than the standalone Tor daemon (which is tor).

tor aka "The Tor Daemon"

The Tor daemon can be launched and run on a system to connect it to the Tor network. It in turn operates on a SOCKS proxy over which you can send application traffic through to send over the Tor network. It is designed to run transparently and silently on the system, and does not execute any type of other programs - it only runs the daemon and the corresponding proxy which can be used to send data through.

It does not launch the Tor Browser as it is designed to run separately as its own daemon, and not to launch the Tor browser.

Best Answer

Related Solutions

Ubuntu – How to update Tor browser

Ubuntu – Tor command is not starting Tor Browser

Related Question