can't detect wireless

[billy the impaler]

Ok, first, I'm a noob. And while I'm not helpless on a computer, I don't frickin understand most of what I've read so far on the forum.
I have a Gateway laptop with a builtin Broadcom wireless 802.11g in it. I'm running a live distro of DSL. And I discovered the same thing the rest of you did: Linux and Broadcom don't play nice together.
Since I don't have any frickin idea of what you guys are talking about, I can't make heads or tails out of the existing threads. Is there an explanation--in English--of how to make the two play nice together i.e. download this from here, then type this, etc.? If sending $50 on an external adapter from Best Buy is the answer, I have no objection to doing that. I don't do mail order, so it'd have to be available at a brick & mortar store.
Any help? TIA.

[waterhead]

More specific info on the wireless is needed. Enter this command in a terminal window, then copy the output and post it here in the thread.

/sbin/lspci -nn

[billy the impaler]

More specific info on the wireless is needed. Enter this command in a terminal window, then copy the output and post it here in the thread.

/sbin/lspci -nn

Ok, being that DSL isn't functional for me because I have no internet connection, I haven't been on it much. Where does one find a "terminal window?" Is the resulting output likely to be so long that I can't write it down to transfer it to Windows OS to get on the internet to post this info?

[billy the impaler]

More specific info on the wireless is needed. Enter this command in a terminal window, then copy the output and post it here in the thread.

/sbin/lspci -nn

Ok, I am using a newer version of DSL now, and I found an icon at the bottom that says terminal. I clicked on it and a window opened titled Bash, and I get a prompt that says "dsl@box:~$" There I entered the command you told me, and I get "bash: /sbin/lspci: no such file or directory"

[waterhead]

Try the command only:

lspci -nn

And/or try it as root:

su <hit enter key>
Password: <enter your root password>
lspci -nn
or /sbin/lspci -nn

It is possible that the lspci command is in a different directory in DSL. Use the Find Files or Search application in DSL to locate it.

You can copy the output to a text file in DSL, as long as you give it a .txt file type Windows can open it. If you can't save it to your Windows folder, save it to a USB drive or a rewritable CD. Or you could e-mail it to yourself.

[billy the impaler]

Try the command only:

lspci -nn

And/or try it as root:

su <hit enter key>
Password: <enter your root password>
lspci -nn
or /sbin/lspci -nn

It is possible that the lspci command is in a different directory in DSL. Use the Find Files or Search application in DSL to locate it.

You can copy the output to a text file in DSL, as long as you give it a .txt file type Windows can open it. If you can't save it to your Windows folder, save it to a USB drive or a rewritable CD. Or you could e-mail it to yourself.

Well. this isn't going smoothly at all. One thing I noticed is that my mouse doesn't function like it's supposed to. I don't know if DSL identifies it incorrectly or what, but cutting and pasting doesn't function like the dillo tutorial says it should. Because of this, I'm unable to cut and paste the results of that command to my USB drive, or anywhere else, ftm. Leaving off the sbin part did give me the results, but I can't do anything with them, and the result is way too long to type anywhere else.

Is there some basic tutorial for new Linux users? Even though I worked with command line entry on mainframes, this is nothing like that, and I have no clue what I'm doing. I looked at Linux For Dummies, but the reviews say that's very version specific with GUI tutorials that don't translate to other versions well.