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sane-usb(5)		 SANE Scanner Access Now Easy		   sane-usb(5)

NAME
       sane-usb	- USB configuration tips for SANE

DESCRIPTION
       This  manual page contains information on how to	access scanners	with a
       USB interface. It focuses on two	main topics: getting the  scanner  de-
       tected by the operating system kernel and using it with SANE.

       This  page  applies  to USB most	backends and scanners, as they use the
       generic sanei_usb interface. However, there is one exception: USB Scan-
       ners supported by the sane-microtek2(5) backend need a special USB ker-
       nel driver.

QUICK START
       This is a short HOWTO-like section. For the full	details, read the fol-
       lowing sections.	The goal of this section is to	get  the  scanner  de-
       tected by sane-find-scanner(1).

       Run  sane-find-scanner(1).   If	it lists your scanner with the correct
       vendor and product ids, you are done. See section SANE ISSUES  for  de-
       tails on	how to go on.

       sane-find-scanner(1)  doesn't  list your	scanner? Does it work as root?
       If yes, there is	a permission issue.  See the LIBUSB  section  for  de-
       tails.

       Nothing	is found even as root? Check that your kernel supports USB and
       that libusb is installed	(see section LIBUSB).

USB ACCESS METHODS
       For accessing USB devices, the USB library libusb is used.  There  used
       to  exist another method	to access USB devices: the kernel scanner dri-
       ver. The	kernel scanner driver method is	deprecated  and	 shouldn't  be
       used  anymore.  It  may be removed from SANE at any time. In Linux, the
       kernel scanner driver has been removed in the 2.6.* kernel series. Only
       libusb access is	documented in this manual page.

LIBUSB
       SANE can	only use libusb	0.1.6 or newer.	It needs to  be	 installed  at
       build-time. Modern Linux	distributions and other	operating systems come
       with libusb.

       Libusb  can  only access	your scanner if	it's not claimed by the	kernel
       scanner driver. If you want to use libusb,  unload  the	kernel	driver
       (e.g. rmmod scanner under Linux)	or disable the driver when compiling a
       new kernel. For Linux, your kernel needs	support	for the	USB filesystem
       (usbfs).	For kernels older than 2.4.19, replace "usbfs" with "usbdevfs"
       because	the  name has changed. This filesystem must be mounted.	That's
       done automatically at boot time,	if /etc/fstab  contains	 a  line  like
       this:

	      none /proc/bus/usb usbfs defaults	 0  0

       The  permissions	 for  the device files used by libusb must be adjusted
       for user	access.	Otherwise only root can	use SANE devices.  For	Linux,
       the  devices  are  located in /proc/bus/usb/ or in /dev/bus/usb,	if you
       use udev. There are directories named e.g. "001"	(the  bus  name)  con-
       taining	files  "001",  "002" etc. (the device files). The right	device
       files can be found out by running: scanimage -L:	as root. Setting  per-
       missions	 with  chmod(1)	 is not	permanent, however. They will be reset
       after reboot or replugging the scanner.

       Usually udev(7) or for older distributions the  hotplug	utilities  are
       used,  which  support dynamic setting of	access permissions. SANE comes
       with  udev  and	hotplug	 scripts  in  the  directory  tools/udev   and
       tools/hotplug.	They can be used for setting permissions, see /usr/lo-
       cal/share/doc/sane-backends/README.linux, tools/README and  the	README
       in the tools/hotplug directory for more details.

       For  the	 BSDs,	the  device files used by libusb are named /dev/ugen*.
       Use chmod(1) to apply appropriate permissions.

SANE ISSUES
       This section assumes that your scanner is detected  by  sane-find-scan-
       ner(1).	It doesn't make	sense to go on,	if this	is not the case. While
       sane-find-scanner(1) is able to detect any USB scanner, actual scanning
       will  only work if the scanner is supported by a	SANE backend. Informa-
       tion on the  level  of  support	can  be	 found	on  the	 SANE  webpage
       (http://www.sane-project.org/), and the individual backend manpages.

       Most backends can detect	USB scanners automatically using "usb" config-
       uration	file lines. This method	allows one to identify scanners	by the
       USB vendor and product numbers.	The syntax for	specifying  a  scanner
       this way	is:

	      usb VENDOR PRODUCT

       where VENDOR is the USB vendor id, and PRODUCT is the USB product id of
       the  scanner.  Both  ids	are non-negative integer numbers in decimal or
       hexadecimal format. The correct values for these	fields can be found by
       running	sane-find-scanner(1),	looking	  into	 the   syslog	(e.g.,
       /var/log/messages)   or	 under	 Linux	by  issuing  the  command  cat
       /proc/bus/usb/devices.  This is an example of a config file line:

	      usb 0x055f 0x0006

       would have the effect that all USB devices in the system	with a	vendor
       id  of  0x55f and a product id of 0x0006	would be probed	and recognized
       by the backend.

       If your scanner is not detected automatically, it may be	 necessary  to
       edit  the  appropriate backend configuration file before	using SANE for
       the first time.	For a detailed description of each backend's  configu-
       ration  file,  please  refer  to	the relevant backend manual page (e.g.
       sane-mustek_usb(5) for Mustek USB scanners).

       Do not create a symlink from /dev/scanner to  the  USB  device  because
       this  link is used by the SCSI backends.	The scanner may	be confused if
       it receives SCSI	commands.

ENVIRONMENT
       SANE_DEBUG_SANEI_USB
	      If the library was compiled with debug support enabled, this en-
	      vironment	variable controls the debug level for the USB I/O sub-
	      system.  E.g., a value of	128 requests all debug	output	to  be
	      printed.	Smaller	levels reduce verbosity. Values	greater	than 4
	      enable libusb debugging (if available). Example: export SANE_DE-
	      BUG_SANEI_USB=4.

       SANE_USB_WORKAROUND
	      If your scanner does not work when plugged into a	USB3 port, try
	      setting  the environment variable	SANE_USB_WORKAROUND to 1. This
	      may work around issues which happen with particular kernel  ver-
	      sions. Example: export SANE_USB_WORKAROUND=1.

       SANE_XEROX_USB_HALT_WORKAROUND
	      If  your old (pre-2010) Xerox / Samsung /	HP scanner is detected
	      only once	and subsequent usage requires  replugging  the	cable,
	      try     setting	  the	  environment	  variable    SANE_XE-
	      ROX_USB_HALT_WORKAROUND to 1. This may work around issues	 which
	      happen with particular USB controllers. Example: export SANE_XE-
	      ROX_USB_HALT_WORKAROUND=1.

SEE ALSO
       sane(7),	sane-find-scanner(1), sane-"backendname"(5), sane-scsi(5)

AUTHOR
       Henning Meier-Geinitz <henning@meier-geinitz.de>

				  14 Jul 2008			   sane-usb(5)

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