[sane-devel] Question on Parallel port devices

[Johannes Meixner]

Hello,

On Jan 12 20:40 Mauricio Hunt wrote (excerpt):
> I have a question about the use of a
> parallel port scanner (Epson Actionscanner II).
> In the past I did this and worked just fin
...
> I use Open Suse and it recognizes the parallel port

you did not write what version of openSUSE you use.

In recent openSUSE the package libieee1284 was dropped
(in March 2018) because libieee1284 requires Python2
which is is considered to be deprecated/outdated.

The libieee1284 package provides lower level functionality
that is used by sane-backends for parallel port access.

Accordingly parallel port scanner support is also dropped
in recent openSUSE, see

https://build.opensuse.org/package/view_file/graphics/sane-backends/sane-backends.changes?expand=1

that reads (excerpt):
---------------------------------------------------------------
Wed Mar 21 16:29:29 CET 2018 - jsmeix at suse.de

- Drop BuildRequires for libieee1284-devel and libieee1284
   which is only needed for some parallel port scanners
   but parallel port scanners are no longer supported
   so that the backends canon_pp, hpsj5s, and mustek_pp
   are no longer provided.
---------------------------------------------------------------


If you use a recent openSUSE without libieee1284
it might work to install libieee1284 plus sane-backends
from the last openSUSE where libieee1284 was included
or run the last openSUSE where libieee1284 was included
within a virtual machine or something like that.

I think the last openSUSE where libieee1284 was included is
openSUSE:Leap:42.3.


In general support for the parallel port is more or less dropped
in practice because support for something that almost nobody
actually uses is not possible in practice, cf. the section 
about "Parallel port printers" in

https://en.opensuse.org/SDB:Installing_a_Printer

and see also

https://alioth-lists.debian.net/pipermail/sane-devel/2015-September/thread.html

In particular I do no longer use parallel port devices since
a long time so that I cannot do any kind of very basic test
whether or not parallel port stuff works in any way.


Kind Regards
Johannes Meixner
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