New Label Printer Issue

[walk5]

So I bought a new label printer. My old one did not support Linux based systems. My new printer says it does. I got it and there was no instructions for how to make it run with Linux. So I called their tech support and was told that nobody there was able to help me make this work. I need this label printer to work. I tried to install the Linux file but I don't think I did it right. Not even sure what to do next. I am kind of new to Linux.

Information:
Kubuntu 20.04
Plasma version 5.18.5
Seiko Smart Label Printer 620

I hope that I have given enough info. If you need any more please let me know. Thank you in advance.

[oshunluvr]

What "linux file"

[walk5]

Seiko provides a file for Linux that is supposed to be the program file. I tried to run it but no luck.

[oshunluvr]

There's a ppd file for that printer here https://github.com/danieloneill/SeikoSLPLinuxDriver

[oshunluvr]

Seiko provides a file for Linux that is supposed to be the program file. I tried to run it but no luck.

Look, if you want help you're going to have to provide info. I didn't ask where you got it. What is it? What name is it? What are it's contents?

[walk5]

I am sorry. I am new to all of this and I should have asked what you meant.

I checked my computer for what the information you asked for. All I have an exe file titled labelgrid.exe and some information files.

I saw the post about a ppd file but I do not know what to do with that.

I very much appreciate your help.

[walk5]

The information files are installation guides that are no help and user manuals in a few languages. The user guide tells you how to use the printer with windows and mac.

I also just found an autorun.inf file and a setup.exe file.

[walk5]

I followed the link to the ppd. I downloaded and unzipped the ppd files. There was a read me file that I read. I am not sure what to do. As I stated earlier, I am still new to this and the directions confuse me.

Here is most of the instructions:
Building the Driver

CUPS libraries:

Building this driver requires that CUPS development libraries are installed. These libraries can be found within your Linux implementation's software installer.

Ubuntu: libcupsys2-dev and libcupsimage2-dev
Others: cups-devel and cups-libs

Other libraries:

(-ljpeg) libjpeg can be downloaded and built from <http://www.ijg.org>.
(-lz) libz can be downloaded and built from <http://www.zlib.net>.

.tar.gz files can be unpacked with tar -vxfz <filename>.
.tar files can be unpacked with tar -vxf <filename>.

Configure with ./configure.

Copy the resulting libraries (usually .a suffix) to a directory accessible to your linker, usually /usr/lib.

After this is sudo commands which I do understand. I just don't know what to do before them. Please help. I had to use my sons old windows laptop to use this and it is not working properly now. So I am kind of up the creek without the paddle.

[jlittle]

The instructions in the read me are out of date, and somewhat disjointed. They include "Configure with ./configure", but there's no configure script.

On my Kubuntu 20.10, I guess that the libraries that are needed are libcups2-dev, libcupsimage2-dev, libjpeg-dev, and libzstd1, all of which I already had. It won't hurt to make sure you have them:

sudo apt install libcups2-dev  libcupsimage2-dev libjpeg-dev libzstd1

I think also that

sudo apt install build-essential g++

would be needed, as there's C++ programs to be compiled (they're the .cxx files).

Ignore the "copy resulting libraries" bit, they should be installed by apt in the right places. I first ran just

make

to see if there were any errors; some warnings, and deprecations, but no errors. (The build "target" is the first one in the makefile, so it was run by default.) Then I ran

sudo make install

It repeated the build and copied files to /usr/share/cups/model/seiko. Of course, I don't have the printer, but this should encourage you to have a go.

[oshunluvr]

Yeah, what jlittle said. There was a zip file I found that referenced your printer but also CUPS 1.1 which is many years old. It had the same files in it from that link I posted.

All the info I found referenced printing from the command line or using LibreOffice.

I would try opening the ppd file with the CUPS browser interface and see what happens. It might just "work."

Printing from the command line isn't as scary as it sounds. You would just need to create a small script that reads a text file, edit the text file to create your label content, then run the script. From then on you could just edit the file and run the script. Frankly, it might be less work than trying to get LO to do it.

[oshunluvr]

I would hate to deter you from trying to get this done in native Linux, but there are other options:

1. Attempt an installation of the Windows Seiko printing software using WINE (do a little web research on this first).
2. Use a Windows virtual machine. Windows 10 has no problem installing in a VM and can be downloaded easily. If you use QEMU/KVM it will run faster than it does when installed on hardware. Virtualbox is a bit easier to set up and use than QEMU/KVM but not as efficient.

The first option - if it works - could be nearly one-step usage, just make an icon that launches the program. The second would require launching the VM, then the program. Of course, you could set the program to launch at startup, it would just take a minute or two longer to get to printing time.

[walk5]

jlittle,
I tried to follow your steps exactly but could not move froward. I typed "make" and received this message

make: *** No targets specified and no makefile found. Stop.

Not sure what I am doing wrong. Please help. Thank you.

[walk5]

oshunluvr,

I tired to just use the ppd file with cups but no such luck.

I am going to try to use wine right now. I do not want to use a VM. I hear mixed feeling about using one and I am only slightly confident I can handle doing that. I hope that one of these methods work.

I appreciate your help.

[jlittle]

make: *** No targets specified and no makefile found. Stop.

That suggests that you've run the command in the wrong directory. I should have mentioned that you should change directory to the directory that has the file "makefile". (Sorry, that detail has been 2nd nature for me since I was a student.)

Sent from my VFD 822 using Tapatalk

[oshunluvr]

oshunluvr,

I tired to just use the ppd file with cups but no such luck.

I am going to try to use wine right now. I do not want to use a VM. I hear mixed feeling about using one and I am only slightly confident I can handle doing that. I hope that one of these methods work.

I appreciate your help.

IMO, VirtualBox is way easier than getting WINE to work in most cases - but whatever works for you.