My parents have this old 2015 MacBook Air that they wanted to use but couldn’t due to no security updates and slow running. I convinced them to let me load up fedora on it instead of junking it. They only really need it for some basic document writing, email, and web surfing so I figured this is perfect for them.
Made a bootable drive with Fedora 43 work station on it, figured gnome would be the most Apple like spin. Everything went super smooth until I realized that the WiFi drivers weren’t installed lol. I also didn’t have a Ethernet adapter for usb-a so I had to overnight it to me while my parents swore I bricked their Mac all night. Got the adapter this AM, hooked it up, installed the drivers and other necessary tweaks, and viola! This Mac has new life.
So far my parents are liking it and understanding it (even though my mom seems more excited about the snoopy wallpaper and Firefox theme, lol). Getting their emails on thunderbird was driving me crazy. Nothing to do with thunderbird, they just didn’t know their passwords smh. All in all not bad. To new Linux converts
I enabled the free and non free repos and entered
sudo dnf in broadcom-wl
That got everything working. I used the Ethernet method cause I am a noob and was not aware of using a flash drive until just now lol. Guess I got something else to learn
You can also just hook your phone up via usb and enable usb tethering, allowing the PC to use wifi or mobile broadband via the phone.
Someone told me that too, lol. I’m learning all sorts today. Oh well. At least now I have Ethernet adapters for every sort of port
No one is born knowing this stuff; everyone learns it somewhere. But omg it's still frustrating after you spend days taking the difficult route and someone says "oh you could have just done this in 2 mins". My sympathy to you! :D But GG on getting your parents onto Linux and saving them from wasting money on a new laptop!