I started dabbling with Linux Fedora 12 in a college course, found it pretty interesting but I an not real familiar with the new Fedora 15. I have little experience with 12, I was told that 15 was better then 12 so I build an old windows based machine to run on Fedora 15, I'm not too impressed with it yet because it is so much different. But the biggest thing I am having an issue with is installing basic programs. such as Adobe reader/flash player, a Linksys wireless NIC card, and a few other programs and drivers. I don't intend on doing anything real special with this machine. I first did a full yum update through a hard line connection. Basically i'm just toying with this and trying to break something i.e. "learning" I tried using the packet installer and not get the results i'm looking for. I'm sure this is a dumb question, but I need a refresher from Fedora 12. I thought on the older Fedora 12 I needed to run a terminal command to execute and do installs? But I cant remember. I'm in no hurry to get results as I am working on other Windows 7 and XP systems for other people. I'm a Windows guy trying something new and exciting.

Welcome back to Linux.

To install software, you can use yum, which is command line front end for the rpm command, or use the GUI add/remove software tool, which is a graphical front end for yum/rpm. Enter man yum and man rpm on the command line for more information.

As regards the wireless, from a terminal window run the command lspci (assuming that it's a pci card; if it's a USB device, run lsusb) and post the chipset here and someone should be able to help you. The chipset is more important than the brand.

Welcome back to Fedora. I liked 12 quite a bit as well. If you've never used it, this guide has some useful tips for Fedora initial setup: http://www.mjmwired.net/resources/mjm-fedora-f15.html

I'm not sure what the chipset is but the card is a linksys WMP54G with version 4.00 PCI card, I don't know where to find the chipset for the card. Checked the website and all the stuff I have on it. The only other numbers on the card are the serial number and the ID number, there is some on the back of the board it self and they are:
E119697
UNIC3 94V Maybe one of these???
0518..
The rpm command does ring a bell, I will have to look into that. Once I get this wireless card going it will be more easy to work with the system in trouble shooting. I will for sure check out the web link to see what I can dig up there. I thank you all for the help, it is greatly appreciated. I hope that one day I too can give some advice to those in need of it here.

rpm & yum cmds
http://linux.die.net/man/8/yum
http://linux.die.net/man/8/rpm

So I was playing around with it again and I thought just for kicks, lets try Fedora 15 KDE instead of gnome. KDE saw my wireless card right away where gnome didn't, Why? not sure but that's OK because I kind of like it a little better. Now on to the rest of the stuff I need to get too. You all were a great help and I will for sure use the advise to finish the job. Thank you all again