I've used Aptitude to install the Hpoj package and dependencies, which are for using my OfficeJet K60 connected via parallel (currently /dev/lp0 according to all the autodetect software I've tried).

The problem is not that Linux can't detect the printer itself but that nothing seems to be aware of the drivers. When I try to use KDE's printer wizard I come to a page that lists all known drivers and OfficeJet k60 is not among them, though many other HP printers are. Same thing with GNOME.

I've been able to send stuff to the printer but it always prints garbage.

Is there a package I am supposed to install to make KDE and GNOME aware of the drivers installed by the Kpoj package?

Thank you in advance,

-TMG

System specs:

Debian 3.? on Dell Dimension 8100 with 128 MB RAM, semi-functional Seagate 160GB Harddrive (I can only use the first 130GB safely), 1.35GHz Pentium 4 processor.

Not sure about the K60, but a lot of the Officejets use the hplip driver package. If it happens to be an all-in-one, you may need a seperate package (libsane-hpaio or something like that) to get the scanner working. If hpoj is the correct driver package for you there is a corresponding sane package for that as well.

Maybe this will help.

Daniel

EDIT: I just took a look at my HP driver list in KDE Control Panel. I have several listings for the K60. I think you need the hpijs driver package.

According to the package description, Hpijs won't work because it's for USB-based connections and recommends that parallel port users, like myself, use the Hpoj package instead. Also, the two packages conflict so I can't safely install them both.

Also, nevermind the scanner. The scanner is...eh...slightly disfunctional and, besides that, I don't need it. :P

I'm fairly sure I already have the correct drivers installed but I want to know why KDE isn't allowing me to select them from a list, like yours is. Apparently I have to give the full path to the drivers, but I don't even know where to begin.

EDIT:

Um...well, I decided to go ahead and use one of the DeskJet drivers.
I know you're technicly not supposed to do that since there are no guaruntees it'll work with non-DeskJets, but it seems to be working okay so far. However, I'd still like to find out how to use the "proper" drivers in case any weird stuff starts happening (which is very likely).

Well, I don't use Debian so I don't know what their particular package names for these are, but I found this page that may help you out. I haven't found any mention of the hpoj driver associated with this printer.

Ok. Here is some info from this page.

So it looks like you need to find the hplip driver and install it.

Hope this helps.

The latest version of HPLIP available from apt-get is 0.9.2 (I think) even though the newest version from that page is 0.9.9. However, when I unzip the targz and run ./configure in it configure fails with an error saying that libusb could not be found. So, I tried manually installing the latest libusb (even though Aptitude says it's already installed) from it's web page. After that, HPLIP complains about some jpeg lib.

So...I uninstalled all the HP drivers I had installed then re-installed HPLIP 0.9.2 from Apt and then all my printer drivers vanished from KDE's list. After restarting Debian they all came back but there's still no OfficeJet driver.

Do you think the problem is that Apt only has 0.9.2 even though the latest is 0.9.9? If so, is it safe to just keep manually installing the stuff that configure complains about being missing, or will that mess up Debian's "internal balance" of installed packages and such?

Btw, I'm sorry if I'm asking/telling you a lot; I'm just trying to be as cooperative as possible.

To be honest, it's been a long time since I used Debian so this question might be better answered by an experienced Debian user.

Having said that...

Manually installing the dependencies and programs you need shouldn't break your system. I believe you're right however in that apt-get will not recognize that they have been updated/installed. You may be able to Google for the specific package versions you need as .deb files and then install them with apt-get. Like I said, you might want another opinion on this.

...oh. wow.
I found a deb package for 0.9.7 and tried to install it and found that there's no less than 7 packages that need to be updated, none of which apt-get knew about. I think I have a bit of work ahead of me now. >_<

Anyway, thank you for your time and your advice. I really appreciate it when somebody commits to helping me solve these sorts of problems.

EDIT:

Sigh...looks like it's not over yet.

I installed all the dependencies, and the dependencies' dependencies, etc. and finally I was able to install the hp 0.9.7 package. Lo and behold, however, I STILL don't have the OfficeJet drivers in KPrint's list. I only have the ESP drivers that came with Debian and ESP doesn't seem to produce OfficeJet drivers; only InkJet and DeskJet.
I'm not an expert on this, but shouldn't there be a manufacturer called HP now? I know I've got all kinds of stuff from HP installed now (because there are several new commands that start with "hp-" that weren't there before), but KDE still can't see the drivers.

Is there a help page I can look at for getting KPrint to recognize new manufacturers/drivers?