Wed Sep 25 23:26:44 1996

This is mscan version 0.1.  See the NEWS file for a list of changes
since version 0.0.  The man page has been fully updated so read it to
find out how to use mscan (it has a few examples in it, too).

The version number shows that you should consider this alpha-quality
software.  Here are a few random points that might prove important in
one way or another to get the scanner working:

	- the code has been compiled under Linux/Alpha using
	  a recent version of glibc; again, I'm out of time
	  to test it on more platforms; since I know of no
	  working driver for the dct436 based card that comes
	  with the scanner, I am using the ncr53c800 driver
	  to connect to the scanner (be sure to turn off
	  "enabled tagged command queueing" and to turn on
	  "not allow targets to disconnect" if you want to do
	  the same)

	- the ncr53c800 driver that I'm using somehow has problems
	  with the CCD_LD (CCD line-distance) command of the Mustek
	  scanner; this problem manifests itself by an entry in
	  /var/log/messages saying something like:

		ncr53c810-0-<target 6, lun 0>: extraneous data discarded.

	  If you see this problem, too you might want to turn on
	  -DLINE_DISTANCE_WORKAROUND in the Makefile and take a
	  look at the relevant code in msci.c.  The workaround probably
	  works for 600 dpi scanners only, but for other scanners, the
	  values should be analogous.

	- you probably want to use a big SCSI buffer (128KB) to
	  keep scanning times down; it appears to be safe to
	  increase SG_BIG_BUFF in /usr/include/scsi.h to 128KB
	  (you'll have to recompiled the kernel)

	- the Mustek scanners don't seem to disconnect/reconnect; depending
	  on your low-level SCSI driver and the devices that are on that
	  bus, this may have bad effects.  I had to increase the timeout
	  values in the ncr53c800 driver to avoid crashes due to timeouts.

	- mscan was tested with a Mustek Paragon 600 II SP only; any
	  other single pass scanner probably works too; three-pass
	  are supposed to work, but I'm less sure there

Have fun!
