EPSON prefection 4490 photo scanner

[Denis Gaulin]

March 17, 2007
	Good day tgo all,

	I am new to Linux OS and Kubuntu (UBUNTU) and I have to say that know very 
little about  how to find, install different packages.. 
	I have 2 older computers ( motherboard MSI K7PRO / MS-6185 ) and  have 
decided to dedicate them to learning  about LINUX. I dedicated one hard disk 
20GB to UBUNTU on one computer and another hard disk 40GB on the other old 
computer  (still working very well)   to KUBUNTU.

	My problem is .. I have an EPSON scanner,  4490 perfection 4490 PHOTO that I 
use with my Mac IBOOK G4 and I want to switch to these new OS and I do not 
know how to install it on these computers because Kubuntu or UBUNTU do not 
recognize the scanner.
	The Kubuntu Documentation is  silent about scanner package.... nothing in the 
official Documentation. 
	By the way I have one suggestion in order to facilitate usability for 
newcomers  ( people like me who know very little ). The Documentation should 
present the names of all the different programs included  in an alphebatical 
order with a simple description of what they do, serve or support...   Ex. 
What is Ark ? I do not know. 
How do I know that Kamera is part of KUBUNTU as a  program to take care of 
some cameras  and only  certain models ? 
 For instance I am still not sure of what is the purpose of ALSA what it does, 
etc... Nothing is said in the Documentation.   
Remenber we are newfy!  to linux OS     
	Anyway After 2 full nights of reading all the definitions of every package in 
Adept  I found '' libsane'' .  I installed the package but nothing happened 
for my scanner...
	I have also found  a ''kooka'' scanner package, I also installed the package 
and it said to install OCVRAD or ORGOCR ( I never found these 2 things ) for 
what purpose ?  No better luck... it still did not work.  It also referred 
to '' Sane''  a scanner source packjage but it contains external backends - 
not tested.....   What does that mean ? and what do  to get my scanner 
running?  I would appreciate some explanations or some reference literature.

Thanking you all for the input.... 


Denis Gaulin, St-Bruno, Qc, Canada