Most notebook computers come with at least one PC Card slot. (Much Linux documentation refers to PC Card technology by its old name, PCMCIA, which stands for the developer of the standards, the Personal Computer Memory Card International Association.) PC Card devices can be installed and removed from a computer while it's still running, and the OS has no say over this matter. Because Linux was designed with the assumption that network interfaces would not disappear without warning, a separate package, Card Services, helps manage these matters, cleanly starting and stopping kernel features related to PC Card devices when they're inserted or removed. You can find more information on Card Services at http://pcmcia-cs.sourceforge.net.
The 2.4.17 kernel includes support for many PC Card network devices in the PCMCIA Network Device Support submenu. Some wireless cards' drivers appear in the Wireless LAN (Non-Hamradio) submenu. When you select such a card and configure it, it functions much like a standard ISA or PCI card. For instance, an Ethernet PC Card appears as eth0 and is configured with the standard tools, as described in Chapter 2.
Kernels prior to the 2.4.x series required a separate package of drivers to use PC Card devices, and in fact many PC Card devices are still not supported in the standard kernel. You may therefore need to check out this package, which is part of the Card Services collection. You're unlikely to need to use special drivers for a PC Card network device if you use a 2.4.x or later kernel, but you might need this for a modem, SCSI host adapter, or something else.
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