Re: Debian install , need to add wireless firmware

[Brian <ad44@cityscape.co.uk>]

On Sun 06 Nov 2011 at 04:00:09 -0800, rose perry wrote:

> Hello, I must clarify a few things,  I have no cd's no usb keys and im using
> the installer from google goodbye microsoft.  I can't install from network
> because it can't detect my wireless card.  I have the firmware on my win XP
> partition but have no idea how to get it to the installer.  Any ideas would
> be greatly appreciated.  Thank You.

Borrowing or buying a USB stick would make installing Debian so much
easier but, if you want an interesting and life-enhancing experience,
here we go:

1. Get the goodbye-microsoft installer going. Do the detection and
   configuration of the network part of the menu. It won't work of
   course, but you will make notes of any messages. Pressing Alt-F4
   will also give you much more information.

2. Partition and install the base system. After that there is little
   you can do because there is no net access. Install GRUB to the mbr
   and finish the installation.

3. You can now boot Debian - we hope! Still no net access but you have
   a working system which can do many things. One operation you want to
   carry out is to mount the device which has Windows on it. Like so:

	mount /dev/sdaX /mnt

   You want to do this because you are going to download quite a few
   .deb files in Windows, transfer them to the Debian installation
   using Debian and install them with dpkg. Have you bought that USB
   stick yet?

4. I'm assuming the base system has enough to allow mounting of a
   Windows file system. If not you'll need to get files for that first.
   You'll want firmware for your wireless card and wpasupplicant to
   connect to a network. Oh, you'll also want all the dependencies for
   whatever you install, but there is a way of finding out what they
   are.

All very challenging, but doable and a great learning experience!