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I've an HP Officejet Pro 8500A Plus 910g all in one wireless printer. I've downloaded from HPLIP version 3.12.2 which supports this model running under Ubuntu 11.10 - 32bit version on one machine and the 64bit version on another (both home-user Dell laptops). The result is terrific - a vast improvement over the 3.11.7 version available from Ubuntu Software Center.

How can I get version 3.12.2 correctly installed into Software Center (or Synaptic Package Manager) ?

What is the PPA for HPLIP(or where can I search for it) so that updates can be received automatically without me having to "re-invent the wheel" when a new OS distribution is released ?

Thanks.

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There is a PPA on launchpad but from the package contents it has not been updated for sometime (it is older than the version you have manually installed) - it currently only contains a package for Lucid/Maverick and Natty. It might be worth contacting the maintainer to see if he intends to update this for oneiric.

An alternative Debian package could be from Debian themselves.

However, remember, whilst Debian and Ubuntu share the same format, it is not always guaranteed that a package from debian will always install successfully on ubuntu due to possible differences in the packaging mechanism.

As such - if you are upgrading you will often get the latest version (at the time) of the feature freeze. Indeed - for Precise, the 3.12.2 will be installed when you upgrade.

As such - if you have a good stable system - stick with either the version in the distro, or the latest from HP themselves. You would rarely need to continually upgrade printer drivers during the distro-cycle itself.

Linked Question:

  1. Which is the best way to install new hplip versions?
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  • Crikey, fast response! Thanks very much, fossfreedom. I'll try your Launchpad suggestion and see if I can do that (all a bit new to me - sends the blood pressure up). Good to know that 3.12.2 comes with Precise - overdue. HPLIP team are doing a terrific job, are they not?
    – Andrew Beattie
    Feb 21, 2012 at 23:29
  • ... oh - I should also point out the maintainer of that PPA has not yet created an oneiric repo :(
    – fossfreedom ♦
    Feb 21, 2012 at 23:31
  • Yes the PPA information on the Launchpad link is, as you said, a bit out of date. I think I'll just leave the 3.12.2 downloaded package in the Documents folder, meantime, and get things sorted out when PP comes along. Stable system? Aye, right.I wish I had a pound for everytime I've keyed in the wireless password .....
    – Andrew Beattie
    Feb 21, 2012 at 23:39
  • Don't know what you mean by an oneiric repo but I get the gist. Certainly someone has my machine ticked in the box for 11.10.
    – Andrew Beattie
    Feb 21, 2012 at 23:44
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Another method is to create your own packages from the newer upstream sources; this is called "backporting", and I know that hplip-3.12.2 will backport onto two-year old Debian Squeeze (roughly equivalent to Lucid) as long as the pyppd packages are also backported. You should already have pyppd available in Ubuntu. HPLIP does not take very long to compile, nothing like Chromium or Firefox!

I use this method: https://sites.google.com/site/stevosfilehideaway/Home/backports.txt

In effect, you're doing what a PPA maintainer would do, only locally.

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