scanlite calibration file (canon lide 210)

[Duncan]

bnacht posted on Mon, 18 Nov 2024 07:21:24 +0100 as excerpted:

> is there a calibration file for the Canon LiDE 210 scanner?
> 
> I assume at the first start of scanlite I have seen a path and file in
> this menu. But after the first scan this area is empty.

So I'm not sure I well understand your question.  Hopefully the below 
covers it.  If not please reply with further detail.

First I should mention that I use scanlite, but with a different scanner, 
an all-in-one HP color laser printer/scanner with (mono) fax, with HP's 
hplip driver FWIW.  I don't think that matters too much for the answer but 
just in case...

Second, a quick in-passing mention in case you weren't aware: KDE actually 
has (at least) two scanner apps, the very simple and basic skanlite 
discussed here, and a much more complex and full-featured app called 
skanpage, which handles multi-page documents, PDF as well as image output, 
OCR, and maybe more.  Just something to try if you decide you need more 
than skanlite, tho I prefer skanlite here as it serves my needs just fine 
and drags in far fewer dependencies.

As for "calibration file", I'm assuming you're talking about user-level 
(as opposed to system level, drivers, etc, see the sane-backends or 
possibly just sane package for that) config.  I see here two files of 
interest, both under $XDG_CONFIG_HOME (~/.config/ by default):

skanliterc: obviously skanlite, and it contains all the settings discussed 
below including both the scanner/sane (like resolution and mode) and 
skanlite-specific settings (like file saving path), but it has an old 2021 
date so I'm not /sure/ it's the current file.  If you have a ~/.config/
skanliterc file, however, that's very likely what you're looking for.  
(Maybe the date on mine is simply because I've not changed settings in 
that long?)

scannerrc: The generic name and 2020 date suggests it might be from some 
other scanner app (xsane?) I tried when I first installed the printer/
scanner.  Not sure, but it seems to contain *only* scanner/sane settings, 
nothing skanlite specific.

The second part of your question mentions a path and file "in this menu", 
which is confusing me because at least my live-git-master kde6/qt6-based 
skanlite, run on wayland, doesn't really have much in the form of menus (a 
help menu dropped down by the help button, but that doesn't seem to match 
your query).  Then you mention the "area" being empty after the first 
scan.  There *are* "areas" (not "menus"), and they sort of match, but I'm 
not sure about the "empty" part, unless the UI you are seeing is different 
or maybe it's a bug and the stuff that's supposed to go there 
disappeared?...  Or maybe it's just the GUI being so different than most 
kde apps that's screwing us both up, and if we're using different 
terminology for the GUI widgets too...  So I'll describe what I see here 
and you try to match it.

1) If I try to start skanlite with the printer/scanner off, it runs a 
detection routine and pops up an error that it couldn't find a scanner.  
There's little to do but say redetect (see 2cc below), or quit.

2) When the scanner/printer is on (and connected) and I start skanlite, it 
detects the scanner and I get a two-paned window with some buttons at the 
bottom.

2a) The left pane is a three-tabbed options pane, basic, advanced, scanner 
specific.

2aa) Basic options contains several dropdowns, scanner source (flat-bed or 
document feed), scan mode (linear, gray, color), scan resolution (...), 
and scan area size (various standard sizes plus custom, with its own 
bespoke size settings).

2ab) Advanced options contains brightness and contrast sliders and 
corresponding spin-buttons, an invert-colors checkbox, and a batch mode 
with time delay checkbox with a corresponding time delay slider and spin-
button.

2ac) Scanner specific options only contains a single option here, a 
compression dropdown (jpeg, none).

I *suspect* your particular scanner doesn't have any "scanner specific 
options" so this tab is empty for you, but is where you expected to find 
the path settings, see 2cb, below.

2b) The right pane is the preview pane, with zoom and selection icon-
buttons below it to the left and preview (quick low-rez scan) and scan 
(full configured rez) buttons on the right.

2c) The buttons at the bottom, below both panes, are help (down-arrow)  
and configure... to the left, and reselect scanner device to the right.

2ca) The help (down-arrow) button triggers the help menu mentioned above.  
That's the only actual menu I see in the app, but as I said, it doesn't 
seem to match your described menu entries.

2cb) The configure... button triggers a dialog (thus the ...).  *THIS* is 
actually what I believe you're looking for, as it contains image settings 
like the path to the save location and the format of the filename, thus 
matching your description.

Are you saying that's missing, "empty", or were you (understandably) 
trying to find it in the options pane, perhaps on the scanner specific 
options tab (2ac above), which is empty but for the single setting here, 
and I imagine could be entirely empty for some scanners?

If the latter I can definitely sympathize.  As a "dev-speaking admin" (I'm 
not a dev in that I can't really do my own code much beyond scripting, but 
I'm used to reading git logs and otherwise "speak the language" to some 
extent, and read code well enough to occasionally do trivial patches like 
changing say a 5% zoom-step to 1%) what I (very) strongly *suspect* is 
going on is all the settings in the options pane tabs are actually from 
SANE, that is, they're scanner hardware or sane middleware settings that 
skanlite gets from libksane and simply wraps and exposes in the options 
tabs in the GUI, while the "configure..." dialog contains settings 
specific to skanlite itself... like where the images are saved.  Having 
them separate as they are in skanlite makes /total/ sense from a 
/developer/ perspective, but confuses the (supply an appropriate term of 
your choice...) out of users just trying to figure out where to change a 
setting they remember making at one point that now needs to be different!

2cc) To complete the list, the reselect scanner device triggers a rescan 
for new scanner devices, as if you quit and restarted skanlite (1 above).

(I wonder what it does if you have more than one scanner on and 
detectable.  Does it go with the first one it finds, the last, or popup a 
dialog asking which one?  Ideally the latter, but without two scanners I 
can't test it.)

-- 
Duncan - List replies preferred.   No HTML msgs.
"Every nonfree program has a lord, a master --
and if you use the program, he is your master."  Richard Stallman