the newbie returns to ask another newbie question! i'm running mandrake 9.2 on an ancient presario 1200xl-118. crappy laptop didn't even come with ethernet so i went out and bought a d-link ethernet pc card adapter. on the box, it said it was compatible with linux 2.2. so i thought i was in the clear, but when i try to run the whole internet configuration prog, the card wasn't even detected. is there not plug and play support for linux? so i tried installing the drivers from the installation c.d. and maybe i just don't know what i'm doing but when i double click on the files a prompt comes up giving me options to display, run in terminal, run, etc. i click run and nothing happens. i click run in terminal and the command line comes up for a second then disappears. i was looking over some other peoples posts concerning the installation of ethernet cards and it all sounded like greek to me. anyone familiar with my situation please give me some advice, user friendly advice. like i said in my last post, i'm used to the nexts, and i agrees of windows. i really need help with understanding the installation procedures. by the way, what extension do the install files, and driver files have?

i'm slowly beginning to figure this out. i've come to a wall however. when i'm trying to modify my pcmcia config file, my permission is denied. i know i need administrative priveleges but how do i change that?

try running the command "su" in a term.
That makes you the superuser, root. su gives you the rights.

k, i tried what you recommended but it still denies my permission. how do you change file types from read only to read/write or whatever? i think that's whats hindering me.

Well to change the permission of a file, simply use chmod. Do a "man chmod" to find out about the command and its options.

When trying to do an installation, u are better off log in as root, just in case the installation is trying to create a folder (as most case do) under /usr or any other directory that has only root write permission.