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    #1

    Enabling broadcom wireless w/out wired connection despair

    Hi everyone ! After a few live CD sessions (which are my only experience with Linux) I decided to take the plunge and installed Kubuntu Dapper 6.06 LTS (PowerPC) on a partition on my internal drive. However, I am using a Mac mini (G4) with a Broadcom 4306 chipset for wireless and I am trying to get it to work. I have found many tutorials on the wiki but they all require installation of various packages which are available on the web and my router is so far away from my Mini that none of my cables are long enough ...

    I have a Windows PC with which I can download various files and transfer them using a USB key, but I need to install bcm43xx-fwcutter to extract the chipset's firmware from Apple's OS X driver (right ?) and all I have found is a tarball for it (fwcutter). Unfortunately make doesn't seem to be installed by default, thus I need to install build-essential, and although some kind of Debian package is present on my Desktop CD I can't figure out how to install it  . Can someone explain me how to do that ?
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    #2
    Re: Enabling broadcom wireless w/out wired connection despair

    Hi,

    If build-essential is by default on the cd, you should be able to install it :
    sudo apt-get update
    apt-cache search build-essential

    If you can see after the second command build-essential, so it means you can install it by the command :
    sudo apt-get install build-essential

    Cheers
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      #3
      Re: Enabling broadcom wireless w/out wired connection despair

      Thanks, but it won't work.

      The Dapper Desktop CD is mounted as hdb.

      In hdb/dists/dapper/main/binary-powerpc/packages (which is a plain text document), there is a list of packages and build-essential is the third one. There's some info in this file, but all I can rememer is that is says "Priority : optional" and that it mentions a package located there : hdb/pool/main/b/build-essential/build-essential_11.1_powerpc.deb

      I've checked, and the package is where the file claims it is.
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        #4
        Re: Enabling broadcom wireless w/out wired connection despair

        Why it won't work ? What apt-get install gave you ?
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          #5
          Re: Enabling broadcom wireless w/out wired connection despair

          Well, after I typed apt-cache search build-essential, Konsole (that's what I should be using, right ?) didn't output "build-essential" and went back to waiting for another command. Apt-get install build-essential tells me that it can't find the package.

          BTW once I realized it would not work I tried to install the .deb package directly with sudo dpkg -i '/.../build-essential_11.1_powerpc.deb' where ... is the path to the package on the Dapper Desktop CD. Apparently it tried to unpack and install but I got an error message which said something like "there was an error processing build-essential" ...
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            #6
            Re: Enabling broadcom wireless w/out wired connection despair

            So I guess you will need to access internet and find all packages you need, then...

            Good luck
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              #7
              Re: Enabling broadcom wireless w/out wired connection despair

              Well, I guess I'll have to give up - unless I can find 60ft of Ethernet cable ...

              Anyway, thanks for your help.

              One more question though - do you think the "Alternate" install CD would allow me to install build-essential right from the start ?
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                #8
                Re: Enabling broadcom wireless w/out wired connection despair

                Sorry but I don't know anything about this install cd... I've installed 1 year ago on hoary and since, I'm only dist-upgrading from one version to the next one...
                Maybe you can give it a try, or download all packages needed and install them later on your computer...
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                  #9
                  Re: Enabling broadcom wireless w/out wired connection despair

                  Well, I'll give it a try anyway.

                  I found out something interesting : I managed to download build-essential_11.1_powerpc.deb to my Mac Desktop from packages.ubuntulinux.org and it is only 8 KB in size. If the package on my desktop CD is the same size, then it probably isn't a real package - maybe it links to the package's location on the web ?

                  Edit : I was able to install build-essential !!!

                  The package was on the Dapper CD, but the CD was not known to apt. I tried to edit /etc/apt/sources.list, and while I realized that the Dapper CD was listed there, it was apparently mis-labeled (i.e. apt was looking for Kubuntu 6.06 _Dapper Drake_ - Release powerpc (2006xxxx)  but the actual disc is named differently). Editing sources.list didn't work but I was able to add the CD as a repository by using sudo apt-cdrom and then was able to install build-essential successfully.

                  The 8 KB package is the real thing but apparently it links to various other packages (on the CD) which explains why it is so compact ...

                  Hopefully I'll be able to get my wireless working tomorrow
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                    #10
                    Re: Enabling broadcom wireless w/out wired connection despair

                    I am finally typing this from Kubuntu Dapper/Konqueror.

                    Victory !!!

                    Thanks again for your help sky.
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                      #11
                      Re: Enabling broadcom wireless w/out wired connection despair

                      Really happy for you All the honors are for you, congratulations...

                      And now enjoy
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