Linux Mint Forums

I have been trying to install a Brother MFC-J985DW printer on my Linux machine. Why is it so difficult? Why all the command lines in order to get a printer installed. Can't there be an easier way to install a printer? http://support.brother.com/g/s/id/linux ... edirect=on I am not bashing Brother or anyone or anything. Why can't there be an application made say for Brother printers, HP printers, Canon printers etc. The app made to ask what the IP address is for the printer on your network, then for your network password and then install it. When I have Linux search for a driver for my particular printer, it does not find one. I tried a whole lot of the drivers listed, hoping that one of them would mostly work, but none of the ones listed worked.

The Linux world will have to make things easier for adding printers, scanners etc if you want more people to use the Linux OS. The Linux world will have to break away from the "command line" entry method if you want more people using Linux. So far, in order to change anything that did not come with the Linux OS, a person has to use the command line method, mostly. Some programs are listed in the software directories, but nothing that will add a device to your system. Unless a person is way into computers, the average joe computer user is not going to know the "command lines" to add a printer or add something that is not in the software directories. The average joe computer user will not take the time to research and figure out how to use the terminal etc to enter the command line. Carrying out this thought, so until Linux is made more user friendly it will only be used by more computer savvy persons. Is that what the Linux community wants, or does the Linux community want to "main stream" Linux for the population to be able to use it. Food for thought............

in the synaptic pkg manager if you click search and enter "brother printers" you may well find a solution there as synaptic has a few entries for it for drivers etc....hope this might be of some small help, i sympathise with you as installing printers on any computer at least for me has always been my weak point...DAMIEN

This might be helpful:

https://sites.google.com/site/easylinuxtipsproject/15


This isn't a Linux problem, this is a Brother problem. The question should be, why won't Brother make installing their printer drivers easier? Myself, I use HP printers. HP has kindly provided drivers for just about every printer they have ever made (several thousand models). These drivers come pre-installed in most Linux distributions, including Mint, and most of the time it will automatically see the printer and set up for it. Couldn't be easier.

sorry to hear of your issues; you have been on the Mint forums for 8 years; it all must be very frustrating and annoying for you;

a thing called airprint support arrived with Mint 19: if the printer one buys has that airprint support built in; then Mint would set it up automatically for you; sadly that 2 yr old printer of yours is not on the list;

it must be very frustrating doing the command line stuff: but if I spell out how it might work for you?

Brother make an Installer Tool; that should do most of the work:

so go here http://support.brother.com/g/b/download ... dlang=true

and click to download and SAVE what will be linux-brprinter-installer-2.2.0-1.gz

then open the dreaded terminal; either click the black tv screen on the bottom line; or just pretend it is a piano chord; hold down three keys at once, the control and the alt and the t keys; ........... there ......... that went well?

then you need to copy each line of command below; paste it into the terminal and hit the ENTER key

how to paste ... well, several ways but maybe do your piano chord again and hold down control and shift and v keys ... practice that a couple of times: soon you will be like Rachmaninov ....... effortlessly stretching to octaves ........

so first command is
hit the enter key and sit back and watch: at some point it will ask you which printer listing you want to appoint: from memory, it is no 8 on their list: but have a look; take your time;

the nice thing about the installer tool is it should set up the scanner for you;

Anyone buying a printer in 2018 is likely to come home with an airprint-compatible printer; unfortunate that you were just before the good times;

I appreciate your help getting my printer installed. Several steps to get it done giving multiple permissions. One of the questions was can you give me the URI of your printer? What is a URI? I have never seen that...... and how would ever know what your URI was?

and how would ever know what your URI was?

URI means universal resource identifier; URL means universal resource locator https://stackoverflow.com/questions/423 ... rl-and-uri .. but that may not help you a lot ..

it is a good question; from your terminal, type or paste

so lp stands for linux printing: the center where information for printing is stored;
the info asks it to tell you information that it has there; and the -v stands for VERBOSE so you are asking it to tell you all it knows;

to help us know what you are seeing on the install script;

if you go to the MENU icon; bottom left; go up to ACCESSORIES; then TAKE SCREENSHOT; click to open it and select AREA TO GRAB;

if you run the install script again; to the point it asks you which URI you want to select; can you take a photo; (or just select the text from the terminal and paste it back here please) .. so we can perhaps guide you; (I used to think it was about option 10? on brother's list?)

.. please see this link from OpenSuse https://en.opensuse.org/SDB:Brother_How ... er_Scanner it spells out option 10 and you should be offered an option to click on?? that should be what lpinfo has told you

.. do tell us what lpinfo -v says as well .....