[sane-devel] incompatible iscan-2.11.0

[Johannes Meixner]

Hello,

On Apr 24 16:50 Olaf Meeuwissen wrote (shortened):
> Johannes and I discussed the format of the comment entries after he
> started using what I had started adding on a voluntary basis.  I was
> happy to know that the information was useful.

Many thanks again!
Yes, such information is more than just useful, it is mandatory
so that I can provide good out-of-the-box support.


> To be precise the upload is done by the plugin, not by the backend.
> I wish I had the time for extract the upload bit into a separate
> utility that can be started from udev ...

I would appreciate it so have a free firmware upload utility
and the firmware files provided for download separated from
the proprietary plugin.

By the way:
Compare how HP does the firmware upload for their proprietary
crap models and see how happy I am about such bad hardware:
https://bugs.launchpad.net/hplip/+bug/187049
-------------------------------------------------------------------
The /etc/udev/rules.d/86-hpmu-hp_laserjet_1020.rules file,
which is installed by hp-setup, controls the firmware download.
The firmware should be downloaded at every lj1020 plug-and-play
"add" event.
.
.
.
... the firmware upload happens while the printer
is in its internal startup procedure.
It seems this stupid peice of cheapest hardware becomes
totally confused if it gets data while it is in startup mode.
When this has happened, no further usage is possible...
-------------------------------------------------------------------
The usual warm feeling in the udev plug-and-play hell...


> > I must know which models require firmware upload so that I can
> > inform our users when they try out a free backend where the
> > firmware upload must be configured manually.
> > Again a nice example which awkward things I do to deal with
> > Epson Avasys' proprietary stuff in particular because their
> > official policy is to not help distributors to package their
> > proprietary stuff well and easily.
> 
> Johannes, when did you ask?

See the mail which I appended at the bottom.


> I can add the firmware files to the epkowa.desc file
> if you want

Yes, please!
It is very much better to have explicite information
as a makeshift in a comment than no such info at all.


> but it would be nice if there were some extra fields

Of course.
I asked for "firmware" fields in *.desc some time ago here
on this list, see
http://lists.alioth.debian.org/pipermail/sane-devel/2006-January/015949.html


> As to the "official policy" bit, at least this developer here is not
> aware of any such policy and wonders how you found out about it.

What else could I do when nobody who is responsible at Avasys
talks to me than to deduce from what the actual results are
in the past years?

Whatever you may forward to those who are actually responsible
to make decissions, the results of their decissions show clearly
what their policy is and I just call this the "official policy"
even when such a policy will be of course never officially
announced by them.

If you get the feeling that the incompatible iscan-2.11.0
is the last drop which wears away the stone of my patience
and that I am at the end of my tether to care about the
proprietary mess in IScan, you are 100% right.


Kind Regards
Johannes Meixner
-- 
SUSE LINUX Products GmbH, Maxfeldstrasse 5, 90409 Nuernberg, Germany
AG Nuernberg, HRB 16746, GF: Markus Rex

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