Mozilla Firefox - multiple instances

[Marc Williams]

I've seen several queries about how to open multiple instances of
Firefox (nee Firebird) without encountering the dreaded Profile Manager
prompt.  I saw this thread on Mozillazine about how to do just that:
http://forums.mozillazine.org/viewtopic.php?t=51428

In a nutshell, create this script:

#!/bin/sh 
firefox -remote 'ping()' 
if [ $? -eq 0 ]; then 
#open a new window 
#firefox -remote "openURL(www.google.com, new-window)" & 
firefox -remote "openURL(${1}, new-window)" & 
else 
#open new instance 
firefox $1 & 
fi

Make it executable, drop it in /usr/bin,  and always start Firefox by
calling this script.  I also made sure that my file manager, Gentoo,
calls this script, I changed .htmlview appropriately, and I changed all
my firefox desktop and menu icons to point to it as well.

Works like a dream.  I suspect it would work similarly for Mozilla as
well but I haven't made such a Mozilla script yet to test.