upload2nc

Send scanned documents from Brother to Nextcloud

Scan from Brother Multifunction Scanner/Printer to Nextcloud

The Brother Multi device I have (DCP-L2560DW) does not support Nextcloud as target, but luckily it supports FTP upload. I also have an OpenWRT based router which is always powered on, so the idea is to turn the OpenWRT router to a gateway between the scanner and Nextcloud by setting up following services on it:

• FTP server, to receive files from the Scanner
• A custom upload script which is triggered by files received via FTP. This will post the file to a Nextcloud share.

Advantages

• No adminisrative rights on the Nextcloud server needed.
• No need to run scheduled folder scan on Nexcloud server, the uploaded file will be shown immediately
• No need to install ftp/samba server on the Nextcloud server
• The procedure could be easily adjusted to upload via Samba instead of FTP, in case your scanner does not support upload via FTP

Security WARNING

• FTP is an unsecure protocol (username/password are sent in clear text over the network), but I think that it is ok for my home network. To mitigate the risks one can set up a separate VLAN just for the scanner, but it is out of the scope of this howto.
• The file uploaded by the scanner to the OpenWRT will be sent to the Netxtcloud server via a secure channel if your Nextcloud URL starts with https://

Requirements

• root ssh access to your OpenWRT router to install required packages and script
• user access to your Nextcloud to create a share for scanned documents
• administrative access to your Brother Scanner to create FTP upload profile

Settings on Nextcloud

Set up a file drop upload share as described here: https://docs.nextcloud.com/server/18/user_manual/files/file_drop.html Password is optional as the share permissions will not let anyone list or download files. Save the share link, you'll need it later.

Example share link: https://mycloud.mydomain.net/s/N3XtCl0dShAr31D

Nextcloud URL: https://mycloud.mydomain.net

Share id: N3XtCl0dShAr31D

Settings on OpenWRT router

Login and update package manager

opkg update

Install FTP server

opkg install vsftpd

Configure FTP server

Check if uid 1000 is not taken by existing users

grep 1000 /etc/passwd

Create a system user for FTP use and set it's password

echo 'brother:x:1000:55::/tmp/tmp:/bin/false' >>/etc/passwd
passwd brother

Enable logging and start FTP server

sed -i 's/#syslog_enable=YES/syslog_enable=YES/' /etc/vsftpd.conf
/etc/init.d/vsftpd enable
/etc/init.d/vsftpd start

Add firewall rule to let FTP traffic in

• Replace 'IP.OF.BRO.THER' with the ip of your scanner
• Replace 'lan' with the network segment of the scanner. If you do not have an exotic configuration with many network segments added, then leave it as 'lan'.

uci add firewall rule
uci set firewall.@rule[-1].name='Allow FTP from Brother2'
uci set firewall.@rule[-1].src='lan'
uci set firewall.@rule[-1].dest_port='20-21'
uci set firewall.@rule[-1].proto='tcp'
uci set firewall.@rule[-1].family='ipv4'
uci set firewall.@rule[-1].src_ip='IP.OF.BRO.THER'
uci set firewall.@rule[-1].target='ACCEPT'
uci commit firewall
/etc/init.d/firewall reload

Set up the upload2nc script

Install required packages

opkg install inotifywait curl

Create config for upload2nc

• Replace N3XtCl0dShAr31D with the 15 characters long Share id you saved after creating the share
• Replace 'ThIsIsOpTiOnAl' with the share password, otherwise it should be empty: '' (two single apostrophes)
• Replace https://nextcloud.server.url with your Nextclour URL. No trailing slash is needed.

cd /etc/config
touch upload2nc
uci add upload2nc brother
uci set upload2nc.brother.tmpdir=/tmp/tmp
uci set upload2nc.brother.ncurl=https://nextcloud.server.url
uci set upload2nc.brother.ncshare=N3XtCl0dShAr31D
uci set upload2nc.brother.ncsharepw='ThIsIsOpTiOnAl'
uci commit upload2nc

Copy upload2nc to Openwrt

Download the script to /etc/init.d/upload2nc and set permissions

wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ZsZs73/upload2nc/master/upload2nc -O /etc/init.d/upload2nc
chmod 755 /etc/init.d/upload2nc

Enable and start the script

/etc/init.d/upload2nc enable
/etc/init.d/upload2nc start

Settings on the Scanner

Create an Ftp profile

• Log in to the device at https://IP.OF.BRO.THER
• Navigate to Scan tab / Scan to FTP
• Add a user defined filename in case you do not like any of the default ones
  • Enter the new filename prefix to the list position 8 and click Submit An 8 digit document counter number will be appended to the prefix
• Navigate to Scan tab / Scan to FTP Profile
• Click on an unused profile and set following
  • Profile Name: Nextcloud (This name will show up on the display of the scanner)
  • Host Address: ip address on your OpenWRT router
  • Username: the FTP username you created on the router (brother)
  • Password: Password of the FTP user (the same as you typed in after 'passwd brother')
  • Store Directory: /tmp/tmp
  • File Name: Select the filename from the list (the prefix you created previously should appear on the list)
  • Quality: set it as you prefer
  • File Type: set it as you prefer
  • Glass Scan Size: set it as you prefer
  • File Size: set it as you prefer
  • Remove Background Color: set it as you prefer or leave it default
  • Passive mode: set it to Off
  • Port number: leave it default: 21
    • Click Submit button
    • Click yes on "Are you sure that you want to test?" -> Green Test OK should show up

Create a shortcut

• Select 'Scan' on the touch screen of the scanner
• Select 'to Ftp'
• Select 'Nextcloud'
• Save as Shortcut

Start Scanning

• Select the freshly created shortcut and start scanning

Troubleshooting

upload2nc logs

The script creates some log entries about successful/failed uploads

logread | grep upload2nc

FTP logs

Check FTP logs by

logread | grep vsftp

Trace network issues (advanced)

Install and run tcpdump. It might help revealing firewall issues, etc

opkg install tcpdump
tcpdump -nA host IP.OF.BRO.THER and port 21

OpenWrt upgrade

On sysupgrade the content of the flash gets overwritten, so re-installing of the script is needed by executing steps in the following sections above:

• Install FTP server
• Install required packages
• Copy upload2nc to Openwrt
• Enable and start the script

Comments, improvements are welcome.