SOLVED: HP Color Laserjet Pro MFP M281fdw - unable to scan PART 2

[petedecember]

Greetings folks--
I cannot get my HP M281 to scan. I found the great post "HP Color Laswerjet Pro MFP M281fdw" and tried all I could figure out from it to no avail. Here is my situation:

Document scanner finds the scanner but when I push scan it says "Contacting scanner..." and then it goes to a window saying that I need to install the plugin. I have already installed the plug in, and when I try to do it again via hp-plugin -i it results in a lot of stuff ending with :
File "/usr/lib/python3.8/subprocess.py", line 512, in run
raise CalledProcessError(retcode, process.args,
subprocess.CalledProcessError: Command '('lsb_release', '-a')' returned non-zero exit status 1.

I also tried looking into my "models.dat" file and found that the section header was already "hp_colorlaserjet_mfp_m278-m281" and that "plugin" and "plugin-reason" were already set to 0.

As you can see, I have a mess here and would really appreciate some help!
Thanks in advance!

[cliffcoggin]

Cable connection or wireless? I have that model and can scan wirelessly using something I believe is called airscan. The resident printing expert by the name of brian will doubtless be along to guide you.

[petedecember]

Thanks for the info Cliff--
I am printing wirelessly. I tried Airscan and it didn't help. Docmunet Scanner still sees my printer but when I push scan it still says it needs a "Drive Plugin Installation." And of course when I push next it just shows a spinning wheel for a while but then the wheel disappears, leaving the same window.

Brian, if you are out there, please help!

[brian_p]

petedecember,

Mint 20 does not provide sane-airscan. Where did you get it from? The precise liink would be helpful.

Give

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scanimage -L

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airscan-discover

[petedecember]

Good to meet you Brian--
I simply got Airscan from the "Software Manager"--I just punched in Airscan and it came up as "Sane-airscan."

scanimage -L
yields the same window that says I need to install the plugin.


airscan-discover
yields
[devices]

Thanks for getting in on this!

[brian_p]

Good to meet you Brian--
I simply got Airscan from the "Software Manager"--I just punched in Airscan and it came up as "Sane-airscan."

You say you are using

Linux Mint 20 with Cinnamon, 64 bit

But Linux Mint 20 never shipped sane-airscan. if Software Manager shows it, it is because you downloaded it from somewhere. Please give the output of

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apt show sane-airscan

scanimage -L
yields the same window that says I need to install the plugin.

I wanted the actual output, not an interpretation of the output .

airscan-discover
yields
[devices]

I had thought your scanner is supported by sane-airscan.

@cliffcoggin Don't you have a HP Color Laser Jet Pro MFP M281fdw? What does airscan-discover give?

[cliffcoggin]

@cliffcoggin Don't you have a HP Color Laser Jet Pro MFP M281fdw? What does airscan-discover give?

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cliffcoggin@cliffcoggin-System-Product-Name ~ $ airscan-discover
[devices]
  HP Color LaserJet MFP M281fdw (C23F2C) = http://192.168.1.72:8080/eSCL/, eSCL
  HP Color LaserJet MFP M281fdw (C23F2C) = https://192.168.1.72:443/eSCL/, eSCL
  HP Color LaserJet MFP M281fdw (C23F2C) = http://192.168.1.72:53048/, WSD
  HP Color LaserJet MFP M281fdw (C23F2C) = http://[fe80::fe01:7cff:fe78:63ee%252]:53048/, WSD

[petedecember]

Thanks for your help, Brian and Cliff--

Here is the output of the apt show sane-airscan:

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peter@peter-17Z90N-R-AAC8U1:~$ apt show sane-airscan
Package: sane-airscan
Version: 0.99.21+80.1
Priority: optional
Section: graphics
Maintainer: Alexander Pevzner <pzz@apevzner.com>
Installed-Size: 436 kB
Depends: libavahi-client3 (>= 0.6.16), libavahi-common3 (>= 0.6.16), libc6 (>= 2.29), libgnutls30 (>= 3.6.12), libjpeg8 (>= 8c), libpng16-16 (>= 1.6.2-1), libxml2 (>= 2.7.4)
Homepage: https://github.com/alexpevzner/sane-airscan
Download-Size: 115 kB
APT-Manual-Installed: yes
APT-Sources: http://packages.linuxmint.com ulyana/import amd64 Packages
Description: SANE backend for MFP and document scanners that
 implements either eSCL (AirScan/AirPrint scanning) or WSD "driverless"
 scanning protocol

I didn't notice it before because my terminal window was beneath the window asking for the plugin to be installed. Here is the output for scanimage -l:

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peter@peter-17Z90N-R-AAC8U1:~$ scanimage -l
Output format is not set, using pnm as a default.
scanimage: open of device hpaio:/net/HP_ColorLaserJet_MFP_M278-M281?ip=192.168.0.203 failed: Error during device I/O

The output for airscan-discover is:

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peter@peter-17Z90N-R-AAC8U1:~$ airscan-discover
[devices]

Thanks for the assistance with this!

[brian_p]

peter@peter-17Z90N-R-AAC8U1:~$ apt show sane-airscan
Package: sane-airscan
Version: 0.99.21+80.1
Priority: optional
Section: graphics
Maintainer: Alexander Pevzner <pzz@apevzner.com>

This is a version provided by the sane-airscan author (Alexander Pevzner). It is also not an up-to-date version. What I would do is

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apt purge sane-airscan

and then download and install from

https://download.opensuse.org/repositor ... .04/amd64/

peter@peter-17Z90N-R-AAC8U1:~$ scanimage -l
Output format is not set, using pnm as a default.
scanimage: open of device hpaio:/net/HP_ColorLaserJet_MFP_M278-M281?ip=192.168.0.203 failed: Error during device I/O

Note the uppercase L in the command I gave. Anyway, it is clear that the hpaio scanning backend (driver) is found but not the sane-airscan one. That worries me, mainly because I have always found it to be very reliable.

[petedecember]

Thanks for getting back to me, Brian.

First, I did the "imagescan -L", complete with the capitol L this time, and it yields this output:

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peter@peter-17Z90N-R-AAC8U1:~$ scanimage -L
device `hpaio:/net/HP_ColorLaserJet_MFP_M278-M281?ip=192.168.0.203' is a
 Hewlett-Packard HP_ColorLaserJet_MFP_M278-M281 all-in-one

Then I purged the sane-airscan as you suggested.


I tried to download the sane-airscan from the website but it won't download. It just won't do anything. 133K file and it won't download! Argh! Any ideas on what's wrong?

Thanks again.

[petedecember]

Brian--
Is this the link for the correct version of Sane-airscan?

https://software.opensuse.org/download. ... ne-airscan

Thanks!

[brian_p]

I would do

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wget https://download.opensuse.org/repositories/home:/pzz/xUbuntu_20.04/amd64/sane-airscan_0.99.24-1+84.1_amd64.deb 

Then check the file is there:

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ls -l  airscan_0.99.24-1+84.1_amd64.deb

Then (if the file is there)

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apt install ./airscan_0.99.24-1+84.1_amd64.deb

to install it.

[petedecember]

Thanks for your time, Brian.
I did the commands that you suggested and found out that the file is not available:

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peter@peter-17Z90N-R-AAC8U1:~$ ls -l  airscan_0.99.24-1+84.1_amd64.deb
ls: cannot access 'airscan_0.99.24-1+84.1_amd64.deb': No such file or directory

So, I went to the link I told you about (https://software.opensuse.org/download. ... ne-airscan) and got the same version installed that way. When I try to use Document Scanner it comes up that it is ready to scan and the M281 is listed as the scanner, but when I push the scan button it the only thing that happens is that HP window saying that I need to install the driver comes up.

Could the problem be that I am only running LM 20, and not LM 20.04? (The website I got it from offered versions for LM 20.04 and LM 19.10. I installed the one for LM 20.04)

Again, thanks for your efforts!

[brian_p]

Thanks for your time, Brian.
I did the commands that you suggested and found out that the file is not available:

peter@peter-17Z90N-R-AAC8U1:~$ ls -l airscan_0.99.24-1+84.1_amd64.deb
ls: cannot access 'airscan_0.99.24-1+84.1_amd64.deb': No such file or directory


wget has downloaded the file - otherwise you would have reported an error. The file is put into the directory you issued the command from. It is somewhere.

[petedecember]

Thanks, Brian--

The file name was sane-airscan, so once I corrected that it ran. Here's what it came up with:

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peter@peter-17Z90N-R-AAC8U1:~$ apt install ./sane-airscan_0.99.24-1+84.1_amd64.deb
[sudo] password for peter:          
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree       
Reading state information... Done
Note, selecting 'sane-airscan' instead of './sane-airscan_0.99.24-1+84.1_amd64.deb'
sane-airscan is already the newest version (0.99.24-1+84.1).
The following package was automatically installed and is no longer required:
  libllvm10
Use 'sudo apt autoremove' to remove it.
0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 6 not upgraded.

I tried Document Scan and get the same thing as before, 'Driver Plugin installation is required'. Hmmm.... Any more thoughts?

[cliffcoggin]

Could the problem be that I am only running LM 20, and not LM 20.04? (The website I got it from offered versions for LM 20.04 and LM 19.10. I installed the one for LM 20.04)

You have got something a little muddled here. There is no such thing as LM 20.04. Are you perhaps thinking of Ubuntu 20.04? What precise version of Linux are you running?

[petedecember]

You're right Cliff--
The site where I downloaded the sane-airscan asked if you wanted a version for Ubuntu 20.04 or Ubuntu 19. Thanks for that clarification! According to System Info I am running Linux Mint 20 Cinnamon, Cinnamon version 4.6.7, Linux Kernel 5.40-70-generic.

[cliffcoggin]

I wish I could help further Peter but I am not knowledgeable enough on the matter. Best to wait for Brian to return. In the meantime see if this thread provides any clarification.
viewtopic.php?f=51&t=342119

[petedecember]

Thank-you Cliff! You got me the right link and I was able to download the plugin needed. Now it works just fine!
For any others who are following what I did...

go to https://developers.hp.com/hp-linux-imaging-and-printing/plugins and chose the newest version of the plugin.run

right click and click "save as"

remove the .txt at the end of the name of the file

make the file executable by right clicking on it, go to properties, then permissions and check the box "Allow executing file as program"

run your program that is bringing up the window that says the a plugin is needed, check the box that you have a copy of the plugin, specify where you have the file and click next! The window should disappear, restart your scanning program and it should work!!

Thanks again, Cliff!

[cliffcoggin]

So you decided on HP software rather than airscan. As long as it works that's fine.