HP Printer

[SP2340]

Hello everyone,

I have a HP Officejet Pro 8620 here. I can print to it via cups. I now want to use the HP Device Manager (HPLIP) to control this printer. The printer is connected to the network via ethernet cable.

When I go to Device Setup -> Device Discovery I only have the option of USB. All other options are grayed out. Howe can I get this program to use network setting? Any ideas?

Thanks.

[SP2340]

OK, I found one problem that leads me to another. Somehow I missed installing the hplip plugin. I've installed that now I can see the printer via it's network address but now I'm being told it cannot find the PPD driver. Anyone know what driver I can use in it's place?

[NeddySeagoon]

SP2340,

The ppd file is a printer description file. It should be in /etc/cups/ppd/ with permissions -rw-r--r-- 1 root root
Its provided by the hplip package. You need at least version 3.14.4
_________________
Regards,

NeddySeagoon

Computer users fall into two groups:-
those that do backups
those that have never had a hard drive fail.

[SP2340]

Thnx NeddySeagoon,

Still have a problem that I still cannot configure the PPD file: It is Yellow and doesn't choose the file even when I browse to the etc location and select it.

When I click on the folder icon it opens in /usr/share/ppd/HP so I copied the file from /etc/cups/ppd to this location and still the same results.

HPLIP Software Version: 3.17.6
Device Manager Version: 15.0 (QT4)

[Goverp]

This may be irrelevant, but the hplip package includes some useful command line tools, hp-check and hp-doctor. (run hp-check --help for instructions).
_________________
Greybeard

[shrike]

SP2340,

I have a HP Laserjet with network option. HPLIP requires 'snmp' use flag for networking support. May I ask how u checked network access to ur printer? Ping?

From what I see on the http://hplipopensource.com/hplip-web/models/officejet/hp_officejet_pro_8620.html site your printer is 'fully' supported, binary plugins not required. Also I see that I am in the 'lpadmin' group, not sure if that's optional.

Best,

shrike

[SP2340]

@Goverp:

I run hp-check -c and it spit out the following:

[Goverp]

AFAIK hp-check needs to run as root, and I vaguely recall it hanging if run as a user. It does usually take some time, but seconds, not minutes, to progress past the point you have. Indeed, it's a slow program, so I suppose it's scanning lots of stuff for each check, so the hang might result for a more complex environment than my simple laptop. Here's the relevant output on an Arch box I'm currently using:

[toralf]

[SP2340]

@Goverp:

This one got me scratching my head. even the '--run' stops at the same place.



@toralf:

[ebuild R ~] net-print/hplip-3.17.6::gentoo USE="X hpcups kde (policykit) qt5 snmp

[SP2340]

Maybe someone can figure out what is wrong here. I run hp-setup from the cli and tried several times to pick the right driver.
I tried to load the driver from '/etc/cups/ppd' and also from '/usr/share/ppd/HP'

This is what was written to the cli:

[Goverp]

You're running hp-setup in (default) GUI mode, and KDE is barfing. Try hp-setup -i to get the line-mode version, which should bypass KDE. That said, I think the issue will be

[asturm]

[SP2340]

@Goverp:

I can web into the printer using it's IP Address and I can access CUPS which shows the printer too.
Tried to run hp-setup -i 192.168.15.50 but it still gets stuck at the driver part stating that it cannot find the driver even when I point it to the correct directory.

[Goverp]

Yup, that's what others report. So just defining the printer in CUPS should work. What you'll lose is the info on internal status (ink levels etc.) and a nice GUI (if you can get it to work; in my experience it has problems with later versions of KDE/Qt) to set paper sizes and so forth. I'm not sure if you can similarly bypass hp-setup for scanner functions (if your box has a scanner), but that's probably just a question of configuring SANE.
_________________
Greybeard

[SP2340]

Yes, I was going to use this for monitoring ink levels and scanning. Now I'm going to have to setup sane to do my scanning.

I found in the KDE setup menu under printers I can see the ink levels so I think I'm going to be good there.

Thanks again for all your help.

[jburns]

The command you want is hp-toolbox, the desktop icon is HP Device Manager. Under the Device menue select Setup Device.

[russK]

You will want this in make.conf for sane:

[SP2340]

@jburns:

Yeah, that give me the GUI interface and as I stated in the beginning I cannot pick the ppd file to be used thus I tried the cli to see what errors if any would be spit out.


@russK:

Thanks this has already been setup.

[SP2340]

So I'm not any further than I was before. Got a tip to ask at https://answers.launchpad.net/hplip.
I thinking if they cannot help then maybe I'll try the Sabayon maintainer. Maybe he/she can point to what I'm doing wrong.

[Tony0945]

For my (very old) HP 2610Xi printer the later versions of hplip didn't work.

I'm now running 3.16.3 but I recall having to get the ppd file from an older version. Sorry, I don't remember which.

Try this link http://hplipopensource.com/hplip-web/index.html
Since Gentoo isn't listed select "Linux From Scratch".

EDIT: I did that back on May 2 based on file date. Sorry I don't recall the exact steps. Like you, I tried many things.
I do remember I had to downgrade the ebuild.

[SP2340]

Thanks you for your feed back. I'll look into this but I do not believe it is because I have an old printer. My printer isn't that old >4yrs I believe.