From: James Knott via Talk <talk@lists.gtalug.org>
On 4/5/26 22:32, Evan Leibovitch via Talk wrote:
Last night, in April of 2026, I achieved a milestone on my Linux system. I was able to scan a document and fax it.
Evan: thanks for your write-up.
I have frequently scanned a document in Linux into LibreOffice or OpenOffice. I had a Linux faxing app, but never used it. I used to fax back in the days when I ran OS/2, but didn't fax a lot.
Scanning on Linux is easy IF there is a driver for your scanner is in the SANE database. One problem is that some scanners have proprietary formats. In our house, we have several scanners: - two Fujitsu ScanSnap sheet-fed scanners. Supported. (I consulted with the driver author before buying the first.) - several Brother multi-function machines with scanners. These seem to be supported by open source drivers but I used Brother proprietary Linux drivers (that are kind of bundled with their printer drivers). - CZUR book scanners. No Linux driver. One was advertised as having Linux support, but it was for a particular edition of Ubuntu. This is a case where a SNAP or FlatPak would have been better. GNOME's "SimpleScan" is simple. All I need. The interface is OK except for selecting fiddly options. It discovers the connected scanners and lets you select amongst them. It can even shuffle the result of a document scanned twice through a single-sided scanner. As for FAXing, back in the day, I used HylaFAX (like Evan) for sending and receiving FAXes. This was on SunOS, then Solaris, and then Linux. I remember that each modem's capabilities were a little different and support took a bit of configuring, not always well documented. It was suitable for an enterprise, leading to more controls that you had to figure out. But it was solid. It could share a phone line with UUCP and CU. I think that the last time I had to send a FAX, I used Windows' built-in FAX software. Apparently it is not built into Windows 11 but you can install it.
As for the government and others insisting on fax, they obviously don't know that it is insecure.
Yeah. But I bet most crooks are too young to handle FAX. Medical info (eg. prescriptions) go between doctors and pharmacies via FAX!