I installed a very fresh Manjaro KDE, but when I went to configure my Brother network printer, the Configuration utility detected it but asked for address and queue even though it’s a zeroconf-driverless device. Luckily I had a reference installation, and after some googling and bisecting my problem, it appeared that the avahi package was installed, but disabled by default on my brand new Manjaro.
I just typed (as root) systemctl enable avahi-daemon and immediately, my printer was identified and I installed it without further faffing around.
I’m a bit dumbfounded by the process. It didn’t take me long because I have some experience, but a complete linux beginner is more than likely to be stuck (or may have to configure the printer in a silly, old fashioned and complicated way).
Not the best experience in my humble opinion, I believe it would be better if avahi was enabled by default. I looked up the older messages on this forum, the same thing happened in late 2022, and supposedly, on Manjaro KDE, avahi should have been enabled since April 2023 (https://forum.manjaro.org/t/avahi-disabled-by-default-is-it-intentional/127359 )
Cheers,
M.
There is simply so many use cases and so many opinions on Manjaro Linux, thus is a self-service distribution - this is the way.
You install, configure and maintain the system - Manjaro is a box of Lego with a pretty installer capable of putting together a simple bootable system - what you after - that is up to you.
- Yes - Manjaro Linux provides an installer
- Yes - a decent set of packages pre-loaded
- No - not every use case has the service configured or enabled
If you need Samba filesharing or Cups printing you need to configure and set it up yourself.
And what you are referring to seems to be the removal of disabling the avahi-daemon.
Yes precisely, it’s been disabled, obviously by mistake, enabled, and now it’s disabled again, for no reason. And yes, I expect that kind of service to be enabled by default on a desktop oriented spin of Manjaro. Especially when the packages are installed by default. There is no valid reason to have them in a disabled state, when the Kde configuration panel depends on it to work. Oh, and btw, the cups service IS enabled by default.
Not enabling avahi is a mistake. The linux distro as a box of Lego metaphor died in the early years of the century. Been there, done that.
M.
A new user could find this information in the Wiki
wiki.manjaro.org/Printing
Enabling Printing CapabilitiesIf easy detection of network printers is needed (not all editions have avahi installed and running) the following service can be installed & started:
user $
pamac install avahiuser $
sudo systemctl enable --now avahi-daemon.service
Any user that does not need access to a network printer is likely to disagree with your opinion
The maintainer of the profile configures the edition as the maintainer see fit.
There is no one-size for that.
Compare the kde profile with gnome and see the difference.
That’s a fallacy. The KDE users with a network printer will all be very happy, most KDE users that don’t need a network printer won’t even know the service is there, until they might want to connect to one and will then be very happy it works as expected out of the box, like any other modern OS does. And a very, very, very, tiny subset of control freaks (that should not be using KDE in the first place because bloat etc.) will take offence at an unused service running in the background. But this tiny subset is also the most likely to be able to disable the offending service themselves.
M.
Bloat? What bloat?
I turned Avahi off when I installed my printer, and I don’t consider myself an expert…But then, I like doing things manually. That’s why I love Linux!
That’s valid, but misleading. My wife doesn’t love linux, she wanted to print an important 1st January update of an administrative document. And I realised I had forgotten to install the printer on her new computer. I thought it would work like any of the six computers or so I installed Manjaro KDE on so far, just to discover someone had pulled the rug beneath my feet. A 2 minutes endeavour turned into a quarter an hour job. I can’t back it up with numbers, but I suspect that someone who knows what avahi does, is concerned enough to disable it, and knows how to do it from the top of his head doesn’t represent the users at large.
M.
If you don’t have a local DNS server in your own central router, you need Avahi or Systemd-resolved in your computer to find your printer when Avahi or Systemd-resolved knows where the printer’s domain name is.
If your own router has its own local DNS server and knows where your printer is located, you do not need to use Avahi.
OMG…the humanity…(or, first-world problems in a nutshell).
Personally, avahi make me want to
and I wouldn’t/don’t want it enabled by default. I mask it; it’s only on my system at all because it’s crept into being a dependency of way too many packages.
And the opposite is just as relevant and applicable.
That’s ¼ hour + 25 years of Linux sysadmin experience.
No. It’s obviously easier to disable something you already know you don’t want than to know what to enable if it’s inactive (and much easier even than to know that a certain feature might be available once a service is enabled). Note that I’m not advocating the service be enabled across the board, but within the KDE profile, as a desktop oriented version, it makes completely sense ; it’s installed, it is enabled in the xfce profile already, and the printer configuration plugin (installed) uses it without further shenanigans.
M.
If you want your experience to be relevant here, then you should’ve been able to set the printer up via CUPS in less than 5 minutes, and not have to worry about avahi at all.
I can, but I’m not doing that because I prefer integrating my configuration within KDE as much as possible, otherwise I’d still be rocking fvwm or windowmaker, and I knew from past experience it was indeed almost entirely automatic previously.
Picture this : everything on Manjaro KDE can be setup from the KDE configuration application, even Manjaro specifics like Kernels, free / nonfree graphics drivers and linguistics packages. They have their own kcm. Everything. But heaven forbids you wish to setup a network printer, no no no, then, you need to launch a separate browser and access cups on localhost via a tcp/ip port you better know by heart. Now, suck up the fugliest webapp known to man! That’ll teach you, hey young’un ! And don’t forget to be grateful the service is still enabled by default! This is madness.
Again, I perfectly understand people not wanting to deal with a plethora of useless services in a very tightly controlled system like a server or a bare bones station. But I’ve picked Manjaro KDE as a DM on the desktops and laptops I have in my care for ease and commonality, and I expect KDE to behave like the comprehensive DM it aims to be. And, more than anything, I don’t expect regressions and loss of functionalities. Not enabling avahi is clipping its wings for no good reason. Of course my wife’s desktop is unlikely to move from my home, but my laptop prints in a couple of places and I expect it to find the printers even if (especially if) I’m not the admin of the network I connect to. And really I don’t want to ask myself whereas the missing feature is a KDE problem or if a Manjaro maintainer has lost his marbles during an ego trip.
M.