Scan Again

Scan Again is an exceptional utility that is great to use if you have an older or used scanner that you want to put into operation. This tool specifically comes in handy if the manufacturer hasn't provided drivers that are compatible with your operating system. To solve this issue, Scan Again utilizes the open-source SANE routines that were originally developed for Linux but work perfectly on other operating systems, including Mac OS X.

During my personal experience with an HP scanner that I picked up from a rummage sale, I was able to get it up and running by using SANE. Although the SANE utilities are quite effective, they are all command-line, which can be a bit time-consuming. As a result, I made up my mind to create a GUI shell for the command-line utilities. I leveraged the help of RealBasic in creating an interface that would operate the command-line utilities.

Through this process, I was able to come up with a program that handles command-line utilities for you. The program automates the scanning process by first searching for scanners and then putting the results into a pop-up at the top of the window. So, selecting the scanner that you want to use is quite easy. After this, the program goes further to interrogate the selected scanner for available options. This information is then used to populate the spinners and pop-ups with the options available for the given scanner.

As a minimum requirement, you would need to have SANE already installed and working on your computer before using Scan Again to perform your scanning activities.