| sane-pixma(5) | SANE Scanner Access Now Easy | sane-pixma(5) |
sane-pixma - SANE backend for Canon Multi-Function Printers and CanoScan Scanners
The sane-pixma library implements a SANE (Scanner Access Now Easy) backend that provides access to Canon PIXMA / i-SENSYS / imageCLASS / imageRUNNER multi-function devices (All-in-one printers) and the Canon CanoScan Flatbed/TPU scanners. The backend implements both the USB interface and network interface (using Canon's BJNP and MFNP protocols). The network interface supports scanners over IPv4 as well as IPv6 (MFNP over IPv6 is untested).
Currently, the following models work with this backend:
The following models are not well tested and/or the scanner sometimes hangs and must be switched off and on.
The following models may use the same Pixma protocol as those listed above, but have not yet been reported to work (or not). They are declared in the backend so that they get recognized and activated. Feedback in the sane-devel mailing list welcome.
The following models may use partly the same Pixma protocol as other devices listed above, but may still need some work. They are declared in the backend as experimental and need the environment variable PIXMA_EXPERIMENT=1 to get recognized and activated. Snoop logs are required to further investigate, please contact the sane-devel mailing list.
The backend supports:
The device name for USB devices is in the form pixma:xxxxyyyy_zzzzz where x, y and z are vendor ID, product ID and serial number respectively.
Example: pixma:04A91709_123456 is a MP150.
Device names for BJNP/MFNP devices is in the form pixma:aaaa_bbbbb where aaaa is the scanners model and bbbb is the hostname or ip-adress.
Example: pixma:MF4800_192.168.1.45 is a MF4800 Series multi-function peripheral.
This backend, based on cloning original Canon drivers protocols, is in a production stage. Designed has been carried out without any applicable manufacturer documentation, probably never available. However, we have tested it as well as we could, but it may not work in all situations. You will find an up-to-date status at the project homepage. (See below). Users feedback is essential to help improve features and performances.
Besides "well-known" options (e.g. resolution, mode
etc.) sane-pixma backend also provides the following options, i.e.
the options might change in the future.
The button status can be polled i.e. with scanimage -A.
Button scan is disabled on MAC OS X due to darwin libusb not handling timeouts
in usb interrupt reads, but may work when using the network protocol.
The file contains an optional list of networked scanners using the BJNP or MFNP protools (See below for datails on networking support for scanners). Normally only scanners that cannot be auto-detected because they are on a different subnet shall be listed here. If you do not use Linux and your OS does not allow enumeration of interfaces (i.e. it does not support the getifaddrs() qfunction) you also may need to add your scanner here as well.
Scanners shall be listed in the configuration file as follows:
where method indicates the protocol used (bjnp is used for inkjet multi-functionals and mfnp is used for laser multi-functionals).
host is the hostname or IP address of the scanner, e.g. bjnp://10.0.1.4 for IPv4, bjnp://[2001:888:118e:18e2:21e:8fff:fe36:b64a] for a literal IPv6-address or bjnp://myscanner.mydomain.org for a hostname.
The port number is optional and in normally implied by the method. Port 8610 is the standard port for mfnp, 8612 for bjnp.
A scanner specific timeout value for the network protocol can be set using the bjnp-timeout parameter. The value is in ms.
Define scanners each on a new line.
More globally applicable timeouts can be set using the bjnp-timeout parameter as follows:
A timeout defined using bjnp-timeout will apply to the following scanner definitions in the file. If required the bjnp-timeout setting can be defined multiple times, where each setting will apply only to the scanners that follow the setting. The last setting is used for the auto discovered scanners. If not explicitly set, the default 1000ms setting will apply.
Setting timeouts should only be required in exceptional cases.
If so desired networking can be disabled as follows:
USB scanners will be auto-detected and require no configuration.
The sane-pixma backend supports network scanners using the so called Canon BJNP and MFNP protocols.
Canon seems to be dropping support for these protocols in recent scanners. To verify if your scanner supports one of these protocols, check the content of the _scanner._tcp service entry in mDNS/DNS-SD (using for example avahi-discover(1)). If that does not list port 8610 or 8612 your scanner probably does not support the mfmp or bjnp protols.
Both IPv4 and IPv6 are supported, but IPv6 is as yet untested with MFNP. Please report your results on the mailing list.
Configuration is normally not required. The sane-pixma backend will auto-detect your scanner if it is within the same subnet as your computer if your OS does support this.
If your scanner can not be auto-detected, you can add it to the sane-pixma configuration file (see above).
The sane-pixma backend communicates with port 8610 for MFNP or port 8612 for BJNP on the scanner. So you will have to allow outgoing traffic TO port 8610 or 8612 on the common subnet for scanning.
Scanner detection is slightly more complicated. The sane-pixma backend sends a broadcast on all direct connected subnets it can find (provided your OS allows for enumeration of all network interfaces). The broadcast is sent FROM port 8612 TO port 8610 or 8612 on the broadcast address of each interface. The outgoing packets will be allowed by the rule described above.
Responses from the scanner are sent back to the computer TO port 8612. Connection tracking however does not see a match as the response does not come from the broadcast address but from the scanners own address. For automatic detection of your scanner, you will therefore have to allow incoming packets TO port 8612 on your computer. This applies to both MFNP and BJNP.
So in short: open the firewall for all traffic from your computer to port 8610 (for MFNP) or 8612 (for BJNP) AND to port 8612 (for both BJNP and MFNP) to your computer.
With the firewall rules above there is no need to add the scanner to the pixma.conf file, unless the scanner is on a network that is not directly connected to your computer.
sane(7), sane-dll(5), scanimage(1), scanadf(1), gamma4scanimage(1), getifaddrs(3)
In case of trouble with a recent Pixma model, try the latest code
for the sane-pixma backend, available in the Sane git repository at:
https://gitlab.com/sane-project/backends.git
You can also post into the Sane-devel mailing list for support.
Wittawat Yamwong, Nicolas Martin, Dennis Lou, Louis Lagendijk, Rolf Bensch
We would like to thank all testers and helpers. Without them we could not be able to write subdrivers for models we don't have. See also the project homepage.
| 15 Aug 2020 |