[TriLUG] Discussion: Linux and Scanners: 11/5/2025 7pm Eastern STANDARD time

[Steve Litt via TriLUG]

Hi all,

Where: GoLUG Online: https://meet.jit.si/golug
When: Wednesday, 11/5/2025 7pm sharp Eastern STANDARD time
      Arrive 15 minutes early for Microphone check & discussion
Who: Steve Litt, Troubleshooter, Developer, Tech Writer
What: Linux and Scanners

Getting scanners to work with Linux has never been easy, even for those
scanners promising Linux compatibility (Brother, for instance). Too
many moving parts, too little community knowledge, and the knowledge
there is is often out of date and contradictory. Everything's too
black-boxy. So for years I operated the scanner in my Brother
MFC-L5850DW multifunction by scanning to a thumb drive and
sneakernetting to my computer. A productivity catastrophe.

An email on the Orange County (CA) LUG mailing list reminded me of this
problem, and I said "hey, this is 2025, and I have ChatGPT now". So in
45 minutes, by asking ChatGPT the right questions, I was operating my
scanner, from Void Linux. Void then worked with my exact scanner, in
the exact right way. Ancient problem solved.

Void Linux doesn't accept RPM or DEB packages without a lot of
fooling around, so I had to construct everything the right way. Another
three hours and I understood the mechanics behind Linux scanning. The
following is the world's tersest summary:

user<->xsane<->libsane<->brscan5_driver<->scanner

Note: The brscan5_driver could be pretty much any driver for a
particular model of scanner, regardless of brand, as long as that
driver can interface with libsane (the SANE API).

At the presentation I'll showcase everything necessary to interface a
Brother MFC-L5850DW scanner with Void Linux, while at the same time
making it relevant for any scanner and any distro.

Hope to see you there.

SteveT

Steve Litt 
GoLUG Publicity Coordinator