thinkpad 600 mwave driver issues
 

I am trying to configure my mwave modem in slackware 9.0 for my thinkpad 600
Although, the official website says it is included with my kernel, I couldn't figure out where to find it, so I just downloaded the mwave_fbsd_tar.gz
(question #1:It said Linux driver, but then says free bsd, is that compatible with slackware 9.0?)
so im working as root, cuz i figure i certain permissions to set this up... and i don't want to put it in /usr/local cuz i want it part of the whole package so I drop it in /root (question #2: where would have been a better place for this?) well i unpack it, and it makes an mwave dir off my root dir which i assume may cause trouble later on, like if i log in as normal user and try to use modem? I dunno...
so i run the ./configure program (question #3 why when i type configure it does not run but ./configure does? I thought ./was implied in configure command?)
so ./configure does its thing until it gets to the C compiler... it finds it but then i get the following error message: C Compiler cannot make executables. (#4 what to do from here?!) I have checked out gcc and it seems fine, although i don't have any c programs to compile on my own. I loaded a full install so its not that its not included here...

maybe someone could help me backtrack and find the driver included with the kernel? I shudder to think that i need to troubleshoot gcc to find out whats going on there.. but i need to get that mwave working.....
please help
thank you

1.) its a free bsd driver
2.) anywhere including /root your just unpacking the source, to build the files, then you would most likely do a make install to put them where they go. so the directory you put it in is only a temporary place for the source.
3.) i dunno sorry, i always use ./configure becuase configure doesn't work, never heard it was implied.
4.) hmmm...
check your kernel config file. named config, grep it for mwave, and if the option is in there it will show up, slack 9.0, kernel 2.4.20?..

4.5) the reason it would not compile should be that gcc cant compile bsd code on linux..

i know 2.6 has mwave, because i selected it, haven't tried to use it though..

i'll have my box up tommorow, so i'll post more if needed..

i have an ibm thinkpad 600 with the same modem and slack 9.0... so i think we may be able to make this mutually benificial...

like say have you ever used alsa drivers for sound?