[sane-devel] FUJITSU ScanSnap iX500 - default page format?

[Philipp Huebner]

Hi,

I have a FUJITSU ScanSnap iX500 that works quite well for the most part.

One problem though: the default page format is "automatic", which fails
to detect the righgt format rather often and cuts off parts of the pages.

When I set it to the correct size manually (e.g. A4), it works fine.

Can anybody tell me how to change the default page format from automatic
to A4?
I wouldn't mind re-compiling a custom sane-backends for that.

Best wishes,

[m. allan noah]

The fujitsu backend does not have an automatic size option. The page
and image sizes default to US Letter, which is wider than A4. Perhaps
you are seeing some feature of your frontend program. Which frontend
are you using?

allan

Post by Philipp Huebner
Hi,
I have a FUJITSU ScanSnap iX500 that works quite well for the most part.
One problem though: the default page format is "automatic", which fails
to detect the righgt format rather often and cuts off parts of the pages.
When I set it to the correct size manually (e.g. A4), it works fine.
Can anybody tell me how to change the default page format from automatic
to A4?
I wouldn't mind re-compiling a custom sane-backends for that.
Best wishes,
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[Philipp Huebner]

Post by m. allan noah
The fujitsu backend does not have an automatic size option. The page
and image sizes default to US Letter, which is wider than A4. Perhaps
you are seeing some feature of your frontend program. Which frontend
are you using?

You're probably right. xsane and gscan2pdf default to letter, only
simple-scan defaults to automatic.

I would still be interested in changing the default from letter to A4.

Regards,

[Bob von Knobloch]

Post by Philipp Huebner
I would still be interested in changing the default from letter to A4.
Regards,

I would be interested too, if the front end (Xsane, driving an HP 5590)
could be persuaded to default to A4. My wife finds it too complex as it is.

Regards,

Bob

[m. allan noah]

Frankly, your front-end program should save your preferences for
things like page size, so you only set them once. I was pretty sure
that xsane did so. For a front-end that does not, we could change
sane-backends defaults on a per-backend basis, I suppose. I the
backends I wrote (which includes fujitsu) it should be easy. For
example, edit backend/fujitsu.c and search for 8.5 and 11 (the width
and height of US Letter). Change those as required and recompile. A
better long term solution would be to make the default sizes
configurable from the backend's config file. I will think about the
best way to do that.

allan

Post by Philipp Huebner

Post by m. allan noah
The fujitsu backend does not have an automatic size option. The page
and image sizes default to US Letter, which is wider than A4. Perhaps
you are seeing some feature of your frontend program. Which frontend
are you using?

You're probably right. xsane and gscan2pdf default to letter, only
simple-scan defaults to automatic.
I would still be interested in changing the default from letter to A4.
Regards,
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[Philipp Huebner]

Post by m. allan noah
Frankly, your front-end program should save your preferences for
things like page size, so you only set them once. I was pretty sure
that xsane did so.

It does, but in my case the scanner is connected to an LDAP-enabled
workstation and used with many different accounts,
requiring every employee to change that setting first time they log in.

Regards,

[Simon Matter]

Hi,

How about setting the default based on LANG or LC_PAPER environment vars?
Or provide an option to do so? The same is done for printing systems,
isn't it?

Regards,
Simon

Post by m. allan noah
Frankly, your front-end program should save your preferences for
things like page size, so you only set them once. I was pretty sure
that xsane did so. For a front-end that does not, we could change
sane-backends defaults on a per-backend basis, I suppose. I the
backends I wrote (which includes fujitsu) it should be easy. For
example, edit backend/fujitsu.c and search for 8.5 and 11 (the width
and height of US Letter). Change those as required and recompile. A
better long term solution would be to make the default sizes
configurable from the backend's config file. I will think about the
best way to do that.
allan

Post by Philipp Huebner

Post by m. allan noah
The fujitsu backend does not have an automatic size option. The page
and image sizes default to US Letter, which is wider than A4. Perhaps
you are seeing some feature of your frontend program. Which frontend
are you using?

You're probably right. xsane and gscan2pdf default to letter, only
simple-scan defaults to automatic.
I would still be interested in changing the default from letter to A4.
Regards,
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`. `'`
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[Johannes Meixner]

Hello,

Post by Simon Matter
How about setting the default based on LANG or LC_PAPER
environment vars?
Or provide an option to do so? The same is done for
printing systems, isn't it?

"no" from my point of view.


Explanations from my point of view:

I think setting the default paper size based on LANG cannot
work reliably in practice because I think there are LANG
settings where both A4 and Letter are used as paper sizes,
cf. 'parts of Mexico' in
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paper_size
that reads
-------------------------------------------------------
... A4 size, are the international standard used by
almost every country. The only exceptions are the
United States, Canada, and parts of Mexico,
where 'Letter' is more prevalent.
-------------------------------------------------------

And what to do for generic settings like LANG=POSIX
that are in practice useless to set an actually
right paper size?

Finally setting the default paper size based on LANG
must be wrong when a user has a scanner that neither
supprts 'A4' nor 'Letter' (e.g. a small scanner)
or when the user has several sacnners where different
default paper sizes should be used.

Setting the default paper size based on LC_PAPER
does not work in practice because I think usually
LC_PAPER is the same as LANG and then see above.

According to
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paper_size
the fallback for the paper size should be A4
because A4 works in almost every country on our planet
(except nowadays the one single misfit country that
claims for itself it is "first" - "All animals are
equal but some animals are more equal than others").

Regarding the default paper size for printing:

The default paper size for printing must not be set
according to whatever system internal global value
like a locale setting or /etc/papersize or whatever.

The default paper size for printing must only be set
according to what paper is actually loaded in the
printer device in its default paper tray.

It leads to nothing else but an endless sequence of
annoyance for the user when the default page size
that is used by the software does not match the paper
size that is actually used by the (printer) hardware.

What paper is actually loaded in the printer device
default paper tray must be correctly specified when
setting up a print queue in the queue configuration
which is nowadays the PPD file.

Then user applications can use the right page size
according to what is stored in the PPD file, cf.
"PPD files: Printer-specific options" in
https://en.opensuse.org/Concepts_printing

Furthermore see
https://en.opensuse.org/SDB:Print_Settings_with_CUPS
--------------------------------------------------------
There is no such thing as "THE" default paper size.
--------------------------------------------------------

FYI how things can go wrong you may have a look at
https://en.opensuse.org/SDB:Landscape_Printing

Basically 'A4' versus 'Letter' can go wrong in the same
way as 'Landscape' versus 'Portrait' can go wrong.


Kind Regards
Johannes Meixner
--
SUSE LINUX GmbH - GF: Felix Imendoerffer, Jane Smithard,
Graham Norton - HRB 21284 (AG Nuernberg)

[Peter Marschall]

Hi,

IIRC setting the page width in the epjitsu backend was broken
in 2015

I reported this in 2015 in #315231
( https://alioth.debian.org/tracker/?
func=detail&atid=410366&aid=315231&group_id=30186 )
with a patch set that also contained further cleanups

Unfortunetely there was no action until now.

I will update the patchset mentioned in the bug with one that is rebased
against current git head today.

Best
PETer

Post by m. allan noah
Frankly, your front-end program should save your preferences for
things like page size, so you only set them once. I was pretty sure
that xsane did so. For a front-end that does not, we could change
sane-backends defaults on a per-backend basis, I suppose. I the
backends I wrote (which includes fujitsu) it should be easy. For
example, edit backend/fujitsu.c and search for 8.5 and 11 (the width
and height of US Letter). Change those as required and recompile. A
better long term solution would be to make the default sizes
configurable from the backend's config file. I will think about the
best way to do that.
allan

Post by Philipp Huebner

Post by m. allan noah
The fujitsu backend does not have an automatic size option. The page
and image sizes default to US Letter, which is wider than A4. Perhaps
you are seeing some feature of your frontend program. Which frontend
are you using?

You're probably right. xsane and gscan2pdf default to letter, only
simple-scan defaults to automatic.
I would still be interested in changing the default from letter to A4.
Regards,
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[m. allan noah]

Thanks Peter- I've been doing some work in the epjitsu backend this
week. Hopefully I will have time to include your work.

allan

Post by Peter Marschall
Hi,
IIRC setting the page width in the epjitsu backend was broken
in 2015
I reported this in 2015 in #315231
( https://alioth.debian.org/tracker/?
func=detail&atid=410366&aid=315231&group_id=30186 )
with a patch set that also contained further cleanups
Unfortunetely there was no action until now.
I will update the patchset mentioned in the bug with one that is rebased
against current git head today.
Best
PETer

Post by m. allan noah
Frankly, your front-end program should save your preferences for
things like page size, so you only set them once. I was pretty sure
that xsane did so. For a front-end that does not, we could change
sane-backends defaults on a per-backend basis, I suppose. I the
backends I wrote (which includes fujitsu) it should be easy. For
example, edit backend/fujitsu.c and search for 8.5 and 11 (the width
and height of US Letter). Change those as required and recompile. A
better long term solution would be to make the default sizes
configurable from the backend's config file. I will think about the
best way to do that.
allan

Post by Philipp Huebner

Post by m. allan noah
The fujitsu backend does not have an automatic size option. The page
and image sizes default to US Letter, which is wider than A4. Perhaps
you are seeing some feature of your frontend program. Which frontend
are you using?

You're probably right. xsane and gscan2pdf default to letter, only
simple-scan defaults to automatic.
I would still be interested in changing the default from letter to A4.
Regards,
--
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`. `'`
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