HPLIP

"hp-setup -i" should be more user-friendly

Bug #1239807 reported by Kevin O'Gorman
6
This bug affects 1 person
Affects Status Importance Assigned to Milestone
HPLIP
Confirmed
Undecided
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hplip (Ubuntu)
Confirmed
Undecided
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Bug Description

Simple version: hp-setup(1) emits error messages relating to Qt4. Synaptic shows I have no Qt4 packages installed. Shouldn't the "hplip" package bring it in if it needs it?

Details:
Starting a fresh install of Xubuntu 13.04 64-bit, and configuring my printer.

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/HPPrinterInstallation advises "gksudo hp-setup" which fails with complicated error messages, including the variations
  531 gksudo hp-setup
  532 gksudo --qt3 hp-setup
  533 gksudo -i hp-setup
  534 gksudo hp-setup --qt3
  535 man gksudo
  536 gksudo 'hp-setup --qt3'
But the error message from the last of these suggested a way to do the setup directly:
  537 hp-setup -i 10.0.0.104
This worked sort of -- at least my printer seems to work now. The above are annoyances, but I'm not sure how to file bugs against them.

The bug is related to the messages that came during the successful run:

warning: Qt/PyQt 4 initialization failed.
error: hp-testpage -u/--gui requires Qt4 GUI support. Entering interactive mode.

and

warning: Qt/PyQt 4 initialization failed.
error: hp-systray requires Qt4 GUI and DBus support. Exiting.
warning: Unable to connect to dbus. Is hp-systray running?

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 13.04
Package: hplip 3.13.3-1ubuntu0.1
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.8.0-31.46-generic 3.8.13.8
Uname: Linux 3.8.0-31-generic x86_64
NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia
ApportVersion: 2.9.2-0ubuntu8.3
Architecture: amd64
CupsErrorLog:
 E [14/Oct/2013:11:05:47 -0700] [cups-driverd] Bad driver information file "/usr/share/cups/drv/cupsfilters.drv"!
 W [14/Oct/2013:11:07:33 -0700] AddProfile failed: org.freedesktop.DBus.Error.UnknownMethod:No such interface `org.freedesktop.ColorManager' on object at path /org/freedesktop/ColorManager/devices/cups_HP_CP2025dn
 W [14/Oct/2013:11:07:33 -0700] AddProfile failed: org.freedesktop.DBus.Error.UnknownMethod:No such interface `org.freedesktop.ColorManager' on object at path /org/freedesktop/ColorManager/devices/cups_HP_CP2025dn
Date: Mon Oct 14 11:18:57 2013
InstallationDate: Installed on 2013-10-09 (5 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Xubuntu 13.04 "Raring Ringtail" - Release amd64 (20130423.1)
Lpstat: device for HP_CP2025dn: hp:/net/HP_Color_LaserJet_CP2025dn?ip=10.0.0.104
MachineType: MSI MS-7693
MarkForUpload: True
Papersize: letter
PpdFiles: HP_CP2025dn: HP Color LaserJet CP2020 Series with Duplexer Postscript (recommended)
ProcKernelCmdLine: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-3.8.0-31-generic root=UUID=cb16ff71-f756-4dac-889b-cfeef0ce3a6d ro quiet splash
SourcePackage: hplip
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)
dmi.bios.date: 03/28/2013
dmi.bios.vendor: American Megatrends Inc.
dmi.bios.version: V10.3
dmi.board.asset.tag: To be filled by O.E.M.
dmi.board.name: 970A-G43 (MS-7693)
dmi.board.vendor: MSI
dmi.board.version: 3.0
dmi.chassis.asset.tag: To Be Filled By O.E.M.
dmi.chassis.type: 3
dmi.chassis.vendor: MSI
dmi.chassis.version: 3.0
dmi.modalias: dmi:bvnAmericanMegatrendsInc.:bvrV10.3:bd03/28/2013:svnMSI:pnMS-7693:pvr3.0:rvnMSI:rn970A-G43(MS-7693):rvr3.0:cvnMSI:ct3:cvr3.0:
dmi.product.name: MS-7693
dmi.product.version: 3.0
dmi.sys.vendor: MSI

Revision history for this message
Kevin O'Gorman (kogorman-pacbell) wrote :
Revision history for this message
Till Kamppeter (till-kamppeter) wrote :

hp-setup should automatically switch into text mode ("interactive mode") when Qt4 is not installed. The same is valid for most of the other utilities of hplip. The utilities which require Qt4, like hp-toolbox, are in the hplip-gui package and this package actually pulls in Qt4.

Please tell if hp-setup works for you when using it in text mode. If not, please tell what is going wrong so that we can inform the upstream maintainers and/or move hp-setup into hplip-gui.

Changed in hplip (Ubuntu):
status: New → Incomplete
Revision history for this message
Kevin O'Gorman (kogorman-pacbell) wrote :

Text mode did not allow me to set up the printer, so I installed hplip-gui. The printer is now installed, so I'm not sure how I could give you any details about what went wrong with text mode.

Revision history for this message
Kevin O'Gorman (kogorman-pacbell) wrote :

Hmm. Actually, I have a spare partition where I could do another install and try. If you really need details, I could go that route.

Revision history for this message
Till Kamppeter (till-kamppeter) wrote :

Kevin, trying thison a clean new installation as you say would be great. Can you please do this?

Revision history for this message
Kevin O'Gorman (kogorman-pacbell) wrote :

I did a fresh install and was able to recreate the problem. I was also able to see why it didn't work, and what to do. I'll attach the typescript, but I can summarize pretty well

I started with "gksudo hp-setup" as advised, and got error messages suggesting trying --qt3 and -i

I tried -i thusly: "gksudo hp-setup -i" and got a long error response. This is what caused me to file a bug.

What I should have tried was "hp-setup -i" That is, without the "gksudo"; it asks for a password in a GUI dialog(!) but otherwise proceeds sanely. Because of the GUI dialog, it might have failed in a console login, but I didn't try that.

How I should have know that, and why it makes a difference are opaque to me. They may be opaque to other users. Please give them some help with more sane advice in the error messages.

The typescript contains the results of three commands (all three fail)
gksudo hp-setup
gksudo hp-setup --qt3
gksudo hp-setup -i

Till Kamppeter (till-kamppeter)
summary: - hp-setup components need Qt4, but don't pull it in
+ "hp-setup -i" not working
summary: - "hp-setup -i" not working
+ "hp-setup -i" needs better documentation
Revision history for this message
Till Kamppeter (till-kamppeter) wrote : Re: "hp-setup -i" needs better documentation

To the HP developers at HP:

The problem here is that "gksudo hp-setup -i" (or "gksudo hp-setup" in case of Qt4 not installed) does not work. The user has to run "hp-setup -i" so that hp-setup runs as normal user and asks for the password for administrative tasks when needed. Most users do not know that. Also the Qt4 warning message can be irritating to some users. Also in "-1" mode the password prompt is a GUI dialog popping up.

My suggestions:

1. If Qt4 is not installed, simply run in "-i" (interactive mode), without warning message.
2. Make hp-setup with gksudo (or similar) working or let it give a clear message that the user has to run it without gksudo.
3. Make sure that the password prompt always works, ask for the password in text mode if no GUI utility/toolkit for popping up a password dialog is available. Especially hp-setup should also work on a pure text console (like SSHing into a server).

Changed in hplip:
status: New → Confirmed
Changed in hplip (Ubuntu):
status: Incomplete → Confirmed
Revision history for this message
Till Kamppeter (till-kamppeter) wrote :

Kevin, thank you very much for your tests, I hope these will help the developers at HP to fix hp-setup.

summary: - "hp-setup -i" needs better documentation
+ "hp-setup -i" should be more user-friendly
Revision history for this message
Amarnath Chitumalla (amarnath-chitumalla) wrote :

Hi TIll,

Thank you for the information. HPLIP-3.13.9 release has fix for "hp-setup -i" is looking for Password dialog instead of interactive mode.

3.13.9 release contains both "hp-setup changing to interactive mode" and "password in text console" of your suggestion.
Regarding gksu 'hp-setup -i' warning message, needs to look into this.

Hi Kevin O'Gorman,

Please install latest HPLIP-3.13.10 from http://hplipopensource.com/hplip-web/install/install/index.html

Thanks & Regards,
Amarnath

Revision history for this message
Till Kamppeter (till-kamppeter) wrote :

Kevin, or upgrade to Ubuntu 13.10 (Saucy) which got released yesterday. It includes HPLIP 3.13.9.

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