[sane-devel] dell1600n_net and Dell MFP 1815dn

[Jon Chambers]

Hi Julien,

On Sunday 22 July 2007 17:17, you wrote:
> I've got a 1815dn, and it somehow works with your perl script. I'm not
> sure how it's supposed to work directly with XSane, could you shed
> some light on that part ?

I have a 1600n.  The protocol for the 1815dn is similar.  I added 1815dn 
support to the perl driver at the request of someone with a 1815dn and a Mac 
(ie: for whom there was no Dell driver).  Although the differences were not 
huge, it was a real pain to implement and test as I don't have an 1815dn 
myself which is why I didn't then go on to port the changes to the 
dell1600n_net SANE backend.

The largest difference is the ability of the 1815dn to select named "profiles" 
from the scanner menu.  Other than that there were just some packet header 
tweaks etc.  I'd be very happy to provide help if you wanted to add 1815dn 
support to the dell1600n_net SANE backend yourself and do regression tests 
with the 1600n.

> I'm not really pleased with the way scanning works over the network;
> it's a bit too complicated for the end-user of the whole setup. 

I find it ok, but this is the only scanner that I have ever owned so I don't 
really have anything to compare with.

I wrote the perl driver as research to prepare for writing the SANE backend, 
but these days I normally use the perl driver for scanning as the 1600n 
network scanning state machine doesn't seem to sit comfortably with the 
expectations of the SANE protocol which I guess are written with the 
expectation of having more fine-grained control over the scanner (eg: as via 
parallel or USB ports).

While I have received many mails from users of the perl script (thanks, 
complaints and feature requests), I have never heard from anyone using the 
dell1600n_net backend.  Perhaps it "just works" for them :-)

> Do you have any information regarding the USB interface ?
> I'd like to be able to use XSane with this damn thing, and I'm not
> sure it's possible...

I'm afraid I don't.  I bought a network scanner specifically to allow me to 
hide it in an inaccessible space under the stairs away from the computer (and 
kids!) and so have never tried to plug in a USB cable.

I am told that Dell's own linux driver is a SANE driver for USB scanning.  
There is a link to the it from http://www.jon.demon.co.uk/dell1600n-net-scan/

cheers,
Jon

-- 
====================== Jon Chambers =====================
 http://www.jon.demon.co.uk, 020 8575 7097, 07931 961669
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