Target VM/Docker for printer/scanner device

[wambo]

Hello party people,

 

I have an (older) printer/scanner/copy device, that can connect via USB/LAN/Wifi and I was quite happy with it - until now.
I've never really used my phone to print stuff, but that is one of the functions that are not available.

It's a Brother MFC-J315W

 

I can start a scan from the printer, and it would arrive at my pc, but this would need brothers own drivers to work (afaik), also it would usually arrive as .jpg so in the last years I always started a scan from my PC - and the device needs to be running.
It also has a SD card slot, but when I tested it today, it couldn't recognize 2 properly formatted cards, so that seems broken.

But the printer is located just above my unraid server, so I thought there must be a better solution.

What I want to do:  start a scan from the printer, without having any other device running and have it saved in one of my file shares.

Optionally it would be cool to connect this later on with document management tools, but should be easy.

What would be cool - if it came with the solution, would be a platform to easily print from my phone/laptop or other devices, that don't have brother drivers installed.

 

 

Since there are drivers for linux available, I thought it should be possible to create a debian based docker container, pass-through the printer (as USB device), mount one of the shares, install the drivers (print/scan/scan from button)  and... voila?

Are there any docker images that are meant for this already? Or which basic image could I use, to receive regular security updates from upstream?

Or are there any other clever solutions for this? I'm a bit afraid of setting up and maintaining my own docker

Edited January 26, 2023 by wambo

[wambo]

OK, right now my thoughts are going towards an a new scanner with actual document feeding system 😕
But I don't get mail that often even XD