This repository allows you to install the Samsung Unified Linux Driver via apt (or aptitude, Synaptic, etc.). See the other pages on this site if you are looking for alternative ways to get your printer working. All the information in these pages is drawn from my experience and others who have posted at the Ubuntu Forums thread on this topic (also the place to go for help). In particular, my printer is the CLP-550N, which is not multifunction, so I rely heavily on forum feedback to keep multifunction printers working. Although I initially created a guide for using the driver when I was running Ubuntu (January 2007), I have been running only Debian Testing on all my computers since early 2008. This repository was created in May 2009, and has been my recommended approach for installing the Unified Linux Driver since that time.
Using the Repository
Very important: you must have completely removed all prior installations of the Unified Linux Driver before using the .debs in this repository. See the page for your version of the driver for details.
Add the following line to your /etc/apt/sources.list, by editing the file as root (or using sudo), or by using Synaptic or other GUI to add a repository:
deb http://www.bchemnet.com/suldr/ debian extra
(If your interface asks for multi-line input, then the URI is http://www.bchemnet.com/suldr/, the distribution is debian, and the section is extra.)
Install the GPG key (last update: 18 Oct 2009) for the repository (if you skip this step, you will get warnings about installing unauthenticated packages):
single step in the terminal (as root or using sudo):
Add the key file to your keys via Synaptic, other GUI, or by (as root or using "sudo"):
apt-key add suldr.gpg
Refresh your repository listings (apt-get update or in a GUI), and then you should see the samsungmfp-* packages corresponding to the Samsung Unified Linux Driver.
The current package version is 3.00.90-2 (also used as a version number for the 3.00.65 packages). The current legacy version is 3.00.37-8. The v3.00.90 and v3.00.65 packages require udev and a generally more modern distribution, so 3.00.37 may be a better choice if you are using a distribution released prior to 2008. The name of a driver package ("legacy", "3.00.65") is just a convenience to allow all versions to be installable at once; use whatever driver version works for you.
Selecting Packages to Install
You can probably read the package descriptions and decide which need to be installed, and all dependencies should automatically resolve, but here's a quick summary:
The samsungmfp-data package provides the ppd/cms files needed to control the printers, and is pretty much required to do anything at all.
The samsungmfp-data-legacy package provides older ppd/cms files needed to control the printers, and should only be installed if you have problems with the regular data pckage.
The samsungmfp-driver, samsungmfp-driver-3.00.65, and samsungmfp-driver-legacy packages provide all the binary files for the driver itself (printing and scanning); the difference is the version of the driver and required system dependencies.
You may need to manually add printers via standard interfaces, although in some distributions a USB-connected printer may be automatically detected and installed.
The samsungmfp-scanner package connects the scanning driver to sane, enabling scanning support (although for network scanning, you likely also need one of the Configurator pacakges).
Users must also be added to the "lp" group to access the scanner, and then will have to logout/reboot.
The samsungmfp-parallel package should only be installed if your printer is actually connected via a parallel port.
The samsungmfp-lpr package activates the custom Samsung lpr (in a much safer manner than the method used by Samsung), which provides additional features but mandates a GUI interface and additional interactions for programs printing via lpr.
The samsungmfp-configurator-qt3 and samsungmfp-configurator-qt4 packages provide all the custom Samsung Configurator and related software, compiled with either Qt3 or Qt4. These packages require samsungmfp-configurator-data, which holds shared files independent of Qt version.
None of the packages are localized, so all are based on the drivers distributed by Samsung USA; I am not sure how much localization Samsung does anyway, but if you can read this webpage then the Configurator will probably work fine for you.
The only difference between the Qt3 and Qt4 configurator packages is the visual appearance (Qt4 is prettier), the library dependencies (Qt4 has more), and the size (Qt4 is larger).
The samsungmfp-network and samsungmfp-network-legacy packages provide the netdiscovery utility, necessary for network detection of printers by the Configurator and for any use of network scanners. The difference between the two is the libc6 dependency, and the correct version will be automatically installed. You should not attempt to manually install these packages, instead always have them pulled in as a dependency.
The libstdc++5 package will be installed from this repository if not available through your distribution, as it is required by the driver.
Which Distributions These Packages Work With
These packages will most likely not work with very old distributions released prior to 2006 (Debian 3.1 (Sarge), Ubuntu 5.x releases). For distributions released in 2008 or earlier (Debian 4.x (Etch), Ubuntu 8.04 (Hardy) and earlier), the "-legacy" packages are much more likely to work than the non-legacy packages.
The samsungmfp-configurator-qt4 package will only work with distributions released in 2008 or later due to necessary libraries, and so should only be installed in Debian 5.x (Lenny) or later and Ubuntu 8.10 (Intrepid) or later. The Qt3 version should work in any distribution from 2006 onward.
The packages have been confirmed to work in various versions of Debian, Ubuntu, and Linux Mint. They should work without modification in all other Debian-based distributions. There have also been reports of converted packages working in other distributions, such as Gentoo; the alien package (if available for your distribution) or equivalent should be able to convert the packages to any other format. You can access the .deb files directly here.