Questions[brother](ubuntu)

I have developed a piece of software for asset management that prints it's own barcode labels, this software works perfectly on on macOS with CUPS but I want to use an Intel NUC with Ubuntu for production purposes.

The printer I am using is a Brother P-Touch label printer, they all broadly are similar the specific models I am interested in are the PT-P900W (Wi-Fi + USB) and the PT-P950NW (Ethernet, Wi-Fi + USB).

Printing with my software works fine in macOS, it generates the PDF and uses IPP to send it to the macOS CUPS server, and then onward using LPD to the printer. However this same setup on Ubuntu works but the print quality is awful.

I've tried working with Brother and they're not able to resolve it as they say the software should be able to have a print quality setting. I agree with that view point so I did the work to use IPP to get all the printer settings and discover what print features were supported and try changing them, I noticed on macOS the default resolution is 360dpi where as on Ubuntu it was 300dpi, so I tried changing this, but the print comes out the same.

I have read the PPD file and it has a commented out section for resolution, which if uncommented causes the printer to stop working.

*%==== Resolution Features =================================
*%OpenUI *Resolution/Resolution: PickOne
*%OrderDependency: 14 AnySetup *Resolution
*%DefaultResolution: Standard
*%Resolution    Standard/360 X 360 dpi (Standard):      "          "

It feels likely this is a driver issue but I cannot figure out how to fix the PPD to enable setting the resolution and I am unclear if the PPD is the definition of how to talk to the printer, or just the GUI options as there seems to be no code in there about how to talk to the printer.

Tl;dr:

1. I am printing from Ubuntu/CUPS to a Brother PT-P950NW and having issues with poor quality output.
2. I have working and tested software that uses IPP to CUPS to send it a vector PDF file - Quality shouldn't be an issue it works on macOS.
3. There is a notable difference in features implemented between the macOS PPD and the Linux PPD, including that the resolution setting which is at 300dpi rather than 360dpi for Linux/macOS.

Can someone help me to fix this printer quality issue?

I have installed a Brother printer for a friend. The printer is currently connected by wireless to their laptop running Ubuntu. The problem is that when I print, the pages are cut off at the top and bottom margins. What I mean is that the printer (or printing driver) seems to have increased the top and bottom margins on its own without being told to by the computer.

• Ubuntu 18.04.3 LTS
• Brother MFC-J470DW printer
• PPD file shows FormatVersion 4.3 and FileVersion 2.2
• Printer connected wirelessly
• All the documents I'm printing are formatted as Letter (8.5"x11").
• I've tried printing from various apps; all have the same problem.
• Printing from another device on the network (e.g. iPad) is fine.
• The physical paper in the printer is Letter.
• The little physical menu display on the front of the printer is set to Letter.
• The printer settings in Ubuntu are also set to Letter. This applies to both [Settings > Printers > Brother_MFC_J470DW > Gear icon > Printing Options > Media size] and [Settings > Printers > Additional Printer Settings > Brother_MFC_J470DW > Properties > Job Options > Media]

I've prepared a single-page, letter-sized document in LibreOffice with a simple black border around the whole page and using default margins. When I print this page, rather than seeing the whole rectangular border, I only see the two sides of the rectangle. (Print preview is fine, but the physical print is cut off.) Here's a picture to illustrate:

It really feels to me like something in the printing pipeline in Ubuntu is applying an A4 paper size, but I can't figure out where. I say this because A4 paper is longer and narrower than Letter, so it would make sense that something in the printer driver is applying incorrect margins or printable area.

I'm able to workaround the problem using the "Scale to fit" checkbox in Job Options from the dialog path I specified above. But this option causes the whole document to be shrunk down, which is not ideal.

Brother HL-L2350DW | Linux | Ubuntu base

I'm using this printer under Ubuntu (Kubuntu) 18.10.

I've tried installing it via Ubuntu itself (USB connection > Let Ubuntu/Printer find the recommended driver, and use that). Sometimes it have printed, but most of the time not. Was able to print a few pages from Thunderbird and Kate (.txt) yesterday, but then not print a .pdf from Okular. And now it's completely dead again.

The printer throws me error messages like:

• Rendering page 3. (In Printer settings/queue)
• Processing page 2. (In Printer settings/queue)
• Sending to printer (In Printer settings/queue)
• Unable to add document to print job. (In Printer settings/queue)
• Out of memory. (On printer LCD)

I've tried both the Local Printer (USB) and Network Printer, where I've tried all drivers pertaining to the printer, as suggested by Ubuntu and those I've found myself:

• Recommended Drivers > Brother HL-L2350DW series, driverless, cups-filters 1.21.3
• Brother > HLL2350DW for CUPS (en)
• Generic Text-Only Printer (en)

I've even tried to install the drivers from Brother's website (.deb package).

§ dpkg -l | grep Brother
ii  hll2350dwpdrv:i386        4.0.0-1     i386         Brother HL-L2350DW printer driver (lpd/cups)
ii  printer-driver-brlaser    4-1         amd64        printer driver for (some) Brother laser printers
ii  printer-driver-ptouch     1.4.2-3     amd64        printer driver Brother P-touch label printers

Further, I have to log in* on the CUPS interface for my printer.

Depending on the connection type you are using (USB or Network), follow one of the steps below.

(for USB Connection)

1. Open a web browser and go to "http://localhost:631/printers".

2. Check if the Device URI of your printer is "usb://Brother/(your printer's model name)"

   • If the device URI is different from the example above, please go to "Modify Printer" of your printer to select proper device and driver.
   • If your printer is not listed on "http://localhost:631/printers", please go to "http://localhost:631/admin" and click "Add printer" and select proper device and driver.

In here I can't find anywhere to check, and/or correct, the Device URI.

Any ideas or similar experiences? This is gettin really frustrating, to put it mildly.

*Log-in information is the same as your user account on your PC. I.e. Finally stumbled upon that information when writing this here post, so this here is for anyone scratching their heads bloody over log-in info, as I did.

Downloaded and installed the linux drivers from the Brother site here.

But the scanner still wasn't recognised.

You can see here, the drivers installed successfully:

$ dpkg  -l  |  grep  Brother
ii  brother-cups-wrapper-common                          1.0.0-10-0ubuntu6                                        amd64        Common files for Brother cups wrapper packages
ii  brother-udev-rule-type1                              1.0.0-1                                                  all          Brother udev rule type 1
ii  brscan-skey                                          0.2.4-1                                                  amd64        Brother Linux scanner S-KEY tool
ii  brscan2                                              0.2.5-1                                                  amd64        Brother Scanner Driver
ii  printer-driver-brlaser                               3-5~ubuntu1                                              amd64        printer driver for (some) Brother laser printers
ii  printer-driver-ptouch                                1.4-1                                                    amd64        printer driver Brother P-touch label printers

And here, you can see the installed driver thinks it is not 'registered':

$ brscan-skey -l

 DCP-350C          : brother2:bus3;dev1  : USB                  Not registered

When I open Simple Scan, it tells me I have a Brother scanner but that I need to install the drivers.

$ lsusb
Bus 003 Device 002: ID 04f9:01d0 Brother Industries, Ltd DCP-350C

$ sudo dpkg -l | grep Brother
ii  brother-cups-wrapper-common                          1.0.0-10-0ubuntu6                                        amd64        Common files for Brother cups wrapper packages
ii  brother-udev-rule-type1                              1.0.0-1                                                  all          Brother udev rule type 1
ii  brscan-skey                                          0.2.4-1                                                  amd64        Brother Linux scanner S-KEY tool
ii  brscan2                                              0.2.5-1                                                  amd64        Brother Scanner Driver
ii  printer-driver-brlaser                               3-5~ubuntu1                                              amd64        printer driver for (some) Brother laser printers
ii  printer-driver-ptouch                                1.4-1                                                    amd64        printer driver Brother P-touch label printers

Brother seems to have removed the linux o/s config instructions from its support pages - i.e. here and here, which had been the source of earlier solutions to this problem given here and here. The OS support information page in its FAQS and Troubleshooting section refer only to Windows and Macintosh. If you look elsewhere, you will find a page of linux information. It says "The Brother Linux scanner driver works only with a superuser by default". It points to a page where it says is given the means to make the scanner work for non-sudo users - perhaps, then, SimpleScan. That page contains fix downloads for numerous OSs, but nothing later than Ubuntu 13.10. Downloading and installing that file all the same does nothing to make the scanner work. If you grub around long enough you will find there is a linux troubleshooting FAQ after all - just not in the place where you would expect to find it. Getting this Brother scanner to work is like threading a needle in a wind tunnel. The first item on the linux FAQ is 'I'm using Ubuntu 16.10. I cannot scan from my Brother Machine'. That is close enough. It says 'Install libusb-0.1-4'. (The Brother driver had dependencies but it did not bother to check them). I do have this usb lib installed already anyway.

One of the earlier solutions (for a different Brother scanner - and the Brother support page with the solution has since disappeared), is quite helpful. It says to put a line in '/lib/udev/rules.d/40-libsane.rules', though in fact it should, on my 16.04 at least, be /lib/udev/rules.d/60-libsane.rules. And the line it asks you to add includes a reference to a product ID for a different Brother scanner. Looking on the sane website for a DCP-350C product ID (it wouldn't be DCP-350C -- that would be too easy -- the earlier solution is for a DCP-7030 and that has a product ID of "01ea")... so where were we?... looking on the sane website for a DCP-350C product ID. The sane page for Brother scanners has no entry for the DCP-350C. It says if your device isn't there it's not supported. It says the page was last updated on Oct 05 2003. That's fourteen and a half years ago. I believe the 350C came out a few years later, in 2007.

So the old solution for the DCP-7030 said to add edit the sane config thus:

sudo gedit /lib/udev/rules.d/40-libsane.rules

And to add this (in the right place):

# Brother scanners
ATTRS{idVendor}=="04f9", ATTRS{idProduct}=="01ea", ENV{libsane_matched}="yes"

Since my config appears to be in 60-libsane.rules and I don't have a product code, I edited the config thus:

sudo gedit /lib/udev/rules.d/60-libsane.rules

And added:

# Brother scanners
ATTRS{idVendor}=="04f9", ENV{libsane_matched}="yes"

And restarted the machine. This did not work.

I also moved some files the Brother intsall routine seems to put in the wrong place - at least, according to reports elsewhere such as here.

That involved copying Brother files from cp /usr/lib64/ to /usr/lib. (I had downloaded and installed the 64-bit version of the Brother driver).

The instructions to do this seemed out of date. And since Brother's website says its Brscan2 driver must be used with the DCP-350C, the filenames may differ. I copied mine thus:

sudo cp /usr/lib64/libbrscandec2.so /usr/lib
sudo cp /usr/lib64/libbrscandec2.so.1 /usr/lib
sudo cp /usr/lib64/libbrscandec2.so.1.0.0 /lib/lib
sudo cp /usr/lib64/sane/libsane-brother2.so /usr/lib/sane
sudo cp /usr/lib64/sane/libsane-brother2.so.1 /usr/lib/sane
sudo cp /usr/lib64/sane/libsane-brother2.so.1.0.7 /usr/lib/sane
sudo cp /usr/lib64/libbrcolm2.so /usr/lib
sudo cp /usr/lib64/libbrcolm2.so.1 /usr/lib
sudo cp /usr/lib64/libbrcolm2.so.1.0.1 /usr/lib

This blind alley was suggested by Brother itself. It's linux FAQ for the DCP-350C (if you can find it), says (for "Ubuntu 11.10 or higher"):

Copy the following files under /usr/lib64/ to /usr/lib/.

Another tip was to actually run the brscan-skey file that is offered as download with the driver, by simply entering brscan-skey at the command line.

At some point, something must have gone right because the Brother driver now tells me the device is recognised:

$ brscan-skey -l

 DCP-350C          : brother2:bus3;dev1  : USB                  Not registered

However, SimpleScan still says no devices are recognised.

Also, Brother says that brscan-skey allows scanning to be performed from the scanner's own console, using its 'scan-to-file' and 'scan-to-image' options. When I do so, the scanner says 'Connecting to PC', but nothing more happens.

I can get the 350C to scan when I call it from a trial version of a commercial linux scanning tool called VueScan. But the trial version puts water marks across the scanned image, making it useless to me. Moreover, the full version is expensive, and demands an annual subscription. And I only came across it while trying to find a way to get SimpleScan to work - or indeed, any open source scanning software.

The point is that VueScan just works. (But it does so in a way that leaves the scanner dysfunctional to other tools). It proves the scanner can be used with open source tools on Ubuntu. The question is how.

I am looking to install brother MFC 7360. I have installed printer but as scanner concerned it is not working every time when I try to run xsane it says device not connected,

When I try to add brscan-skey to startup program it asks for command line. I am not sure what shall I write in command line.