Hardware

DWT’s main feature is interacting with imaging devices like scanners and cameras. In this section, we’ll look at the supported devices.

• TWAIN Scanners
• ICA Scanners
• SANE Scanners
• DirectShow Cameras
• MediaDevices Cameras

TWAIN Scanners

TWAIN Scanners refer to image scanners that have drivers following the TWAIN standard.

Facts about TWAIN

• TWAIN is an application programming interface (API) and communication protocol that regulate communication between software and digital imaging devices, such as image scanners and digital cameras.

• TWAIN is supported on Microsoft Windows, Linux, and macOS X. However, based on our experience and the experience of many customers, TWAIN only works well on Windows. On Linux, SANE is the better and preferred alternative; on macOS, ICA is the better and preferred alternative.

• TWAIN is actively maintained by the non-profit TWAIN Working Group. Members of the group consists of scanner vendors and imaging software vendors, including FUJITSU, Panasonic, Epson, HP, ExactCODE, LEADTOOLS, and of course, Dynamsoft.

• TWAIN is the most commonly used protocol for image capturing and processing. Almost all scanners on the market come with a TWAIN driver and are supported by TWAIN applications like DWT .

Is my Scanner TWAIN Compliant?

After you have installed the driver for your scanner, you can refer to the following methods to verify whether your scanner is TWAIN compliant.

• [Recommended & Easiest] Take advantage of our official demo page

  • Open the demo page on Windows

  If you haven’t installed DWT, a dialog will show up asking you to download and install it.

  • Make sure the scanner driver shows up in the scanner dropdown list

• If the scanner appears in the dropdown, try scanning to make sure it works correctly without any errors. Errors will appear in the message box under the viewer.

• [Recommended] Use the tool called Twacker which is developed by the TWAIN Working Group

  • Download and install

    In most cases, please dowload the 32-bit version

    • 32-bit
    • 64-bit

  • Open the program

• Select your device

If your device is not listed, please check if the driver is installed. Or, try running Twacker as admin to see if it shows up.

• Choose the settings and try scanning

If scanning is successful without any errors, then your device should be TWAIN compliant. You can also try other commands to see how it works. If your scanner doesn’t work with TWACKER , please check your scanner model online and make sure you have installed the (latest) TWAIN driver from its manufacturer.

• Refer to the official twain-certified-drivers.

This list is maintained by hardware vendors and may be incomplete. In this case, try the two ways above instead.

No Scanner to test

If you don’t have a TWAIN scanner at hand to test the library. You can download and use a virtual scanner.

• 32-bit virtual scanner
• 64-bit virtual scanner

TWAIN and WIA

WIA refers to Windows Image Acquisition, which is the still image acquisition platform in the Windows family that enables imaging/graphics applications to interact with imaging hardware and standardizes the interaction between different applications and scanners.

WIA devices can be used by TWAIN applications like DWT through a TWAIN compatibility layer. This means WIA is not supported natively; therefore, when a device supports both TWAIN and WIA , TWAIN is the better option.

By comparison, WIA can only control a very limited set of general capabilities of the devices while TWAIN can control all standard and even custom capabilities of the devices. Another thing is that TWAIN has three transfer modes (Native, Memory, File), while WIA only has two (Memory, File).

ICA Scanners

ICA Scanners refer to image scanners that have drivers designed in accordance with the ImageCaptureCore Framework.

Facts about ICA

• ICA is a framework from Apple designed to “Browse for media devices and control them programmatically from your app.”

• ICA is supported on macOS X.

Is my Scanner ICA Compliant?

There are 3 ways to verify whether your scanner is ICA compliant.

• [Recommended & Easiest] Take advantage of our official demo page

  • Open the demo page on macOS

  If you haven’t installed DWT, a dialog will show up for you to download and install it.

  • Make sure the scanner driver shows up in the scanner list.

• Try scanning to make sure it works correctly without any errors

• [Recommended] Try the scanner with the ImageCapture app on macOS.

  • Find the Image Capture application

• Open the application

• Acquire an image and see how it works

For more info, please check out the official guide.

• Check out the official list of supported ICA scanners on MacOS.

SANE Scanners

SANE Scanners refer to image scanners that have drivers designed in accordance with the SANE API.

Facts about SANE

• SANE stands for “Scanner Access Now Easy” and is an application programming interface (API) that provides standardized access to any raster image scanner hardware.

• SANE is supported on multiple Linux distributions.

• As of version 16.1.1, DWT supports SANE v1.0.25.

Is my Scanner SANE Compliant?

There are 3 ways to verify whether your scanner is SANE compliant.

• [Recommended & Easiest] Take advantage of our official demo page

  • Open the demo page on Linux

  If you haven’t installed the SDK, a dialog will show up for you to download and install it.

  • Make sure the scanner driver shows up in the scanner list

• Try scanning to make sure it works correctly without any errors

• [Recommended] Try the scanner with the XSane app on Linux. Check out the official guide

More info»

• Check out the official list of supported scanners.

DirectShow Cameras

DirectShow Cameras refer to the cameras which can be accessed via the Microsoft DirectShow architecture. These cameras are either built into desktops / laptops or connected via USB.

Is my Camera DirectShow Compliant?

• [Recommended] Take advantage of our official demo page

  • Open the demo page on Windows

  If you haven’t installed the SDK, a dialog will show up for you to download and install it.

  • Make sure the camera shows up in the device list

• Try showing the video stream and try capturing a frame to see if it works without any errors

• Try the camera with the Amcap app and see if it works correctly.

MediaDevices Cameras

MediaDevices Cameras refers to the cameras accessible via the MediaDevices interface. These cameras are either built into desktops/laptops/mobile devices, including phones and tablets, or connected via USB.

DirectShow Cameras and MediaDevices Cameras could refer to the same devices which can be accessed either way.

Is my Camera MediaDevices Compliant?

• [Recommended] Take advantage of our official demo page

  • Open the demo page

  • Make sure the camera shows up in the device list

• Try showing the video stream and capturing a frame to see if it works without any errors

FAQs

How to exclude WIA sources in the source list

Applicable to Windows only

There are two ways to achieve this:

• Set IfUseTwainDSM to true

DWObject.IfUseTwainDSM = true;

• Filter sources before listing them

var sources = DWObject.GetSourceNames();
for (var i = 0; i < sources.length; i++) {
    if (sources[i].toLowerCase().indexOf('epson') != -1) {
        sources.splice(i, 1);
    }
}

If you are still having issues with a device after reading the above information. You can..

• Check out hardware issue troubleshooting page,
• Or contact Dynamsoft Support