How to verify if my scanner driver is TWAIN compatible?

Question

We have a application which integrates a 3rd party scanning component - Dynam .NET TWAIN. It's working well with my HP scanjet 5700. Recently, we got Cannon LiDE210 but it doesn't work. I finally noticed that our application needs to work with TWAIN compatible drivers.

How can I verify if my scanner driver supports TWAIN? We are going to send the application to other customers. I am looking for a easy way to find out if my clients' scanners support TWAIN.

Thank you.

Answer 1

There is a handy tools called TWACKER...Make sure you run it as admin. Choose File->Select Source, and see if your scanner is listed there. If your scanner is listed, it means you are using a TWAIN driver, in which you can have a further scanning with different scanning settings to check your scanner's TWAIN compatibility. Otherwise, you need to find a TWAIN drvier for your scanner.

You can download TWACKER on http://www.twain.org/scannerdriverdevelopers/specification-and-tools.html .

Cheers.

Answer 2

Inspector Twain could be what you're looking for.

http://inspectortwain.com/

Answer 3

I'm sure the Canon LiDE 210 is TWAIN compatible, or rather, has a TWAIN driver. If it isn't working with your Dynamsoft software, they (Dynamsoft) would be the first place to go for support.

But before you contact Dynamsoft, you should check that you have the correct Canon TWAIN driver installed for your version of Windows, and that it can scan from your scanner. For some reason, Canon Asia has a better page on this driver than Canon USA: http://support-asia.canon-asia.com/contents/ASIA/EN/0100294501.html I hope I don't need to say this: You should only download and install drivers from the scanner vendor's website(s)!

To verify that a TWAIN driver is working, I & my colleagues often scan from IrfanView - it's free, millions of copies in use, and has code that works with pretty much any TWAIN driver. If IrfanView can't scan from your scanner, the TWAIN drive either isn't installed or isn't working - at that point you should look to the scanner vendor for support, in this case, Canon.

PS I admire Irfan Skiljan's work, but have no other connection with IrfanView.

PPS As you may have figured out by now (especially if you played with Twacker or Inspector Twain), "TWAIN Compatibility" isn't an all-or-nothing thing. Different scanners support different sets of TWAIN features, and nearly every TWAIN driver violates the TWAIN standard in SOME way. But don't get me started on that. ;-)