RealTek wifi drivers

I recently had to say goodbye to a 2003 laptop that I was using to run linuxcnc. Trying to get antiques repaired is hopeless. The "new" computer has a RealTek USB WiFi gadget, but it is invisible during install, so I have no Internet connection. I have received a driver set that purports to support Linux. Chipset is RTL8188. There is an easy install.sh, but it seems to do nothing but compile source. Help!

The issue with the RTL device when installing debian is that the required firmware does not conform to Debian strict OSS policy.
The "new" computer, has it not got an Ethernet port ?

Maybe if you throw up some specs of the new machine and the Linuxcnc version you wish to install.

Is it possible to install the hdd out of the Laptop into the new machine ?

This will save you a lot of headaches :
forum.linuxcnc.org/9-installing-linuxcnc...nd-easy-installation

claytoncramer wrote: The "new" computer has a RealTek USB WiFi gadget, but it is invisible during install,!

During the install process there might have been a question asked about installing closed-source drivers.
If you answer yes at that point there is a chance that the dongle will work

(I have the same problem on a multi-boot machine with three different Linuxes, some can run the dongle, some can't depending on what I pressed when that question came up)

Was never asked the question. I bought a TP-LINK USB adapter, and TP-LINK customer service seems to have rolled a device driver for my obsolete version of debian. Everything is working. TP-LINK advertised Linux support and they went above and beyond my expectations.