So my question is what is the expected behavior regarding a printer (HP Photosmart 6520) in OM Lx 4.0? By default the driver is not on the ISO and as I recall that will be the case after install as well.
On the ISO if I run printer config it has my printer recognized but does not have the correct driver and does not offer to install the correct driver (would probably need to install hplip). I selects instead a “HP 2000C Foomatic” driver which will print a rather ugly test page. So should the system-config-printer offer to install the correct driver? Or is this up to users to just know what package they need for their printer to work? The kcm_shell printer config in systemsettings does less even, user has to pick a driver and hope it works.
To clarify the reason for this question is so that forum helpers and other contributors know what exactly to tell users is expected behavior.
We may need to be prepared for this question and be prepared to offer advice. Like say if you have Brother install <what?> there is not task-printing that I see for Brother for instance. For Epson I guess they would install task-printer-epson? ect.? Of course if they have a Canon printer the answer is . Unless they get lucky and task-printing-canon works.
I well know what software I may want to install for my printer and how to get it to work. That is not an issue for me.
One more thing on expected printer behavior. On ISO or installed hardware system when I first turn printer on it will pop up a dialog window offering to search for printer driver. If I select that it just goes away and never responds.
Oh but there is more to this. If I install myself ‘task-printing-hp’ and reboot my computer with printer off. After reboot and desktop settles down I turn on printer and it is then correctly configured automagically with correct driver. All I did as user was turn printer on the rest was automatic. Wonderful!
OK this is all fine and dandy since I already know what to install for my printer. If this is expected behavior I’m fine with it.
However if it is then we on the forum and as contributors may find ourselves needing to explain this to users a few times. But there is nothing unreasonable about this it is just different from our (OMA) approach in the past. I probably like this better as users don’t get stuck with a gazillion packages for printers they don’t have.
@ben79
Hp is very friendly with open source they may provide a driver or CUPS PPD files for your printer . I had to get one from HP and Samsung for my laser printers. The PPD files are located in /etc/cups/ppd.
