I upgraded to hplip 3.17.10+repack0-5 (as part of upgrading to Ubuntu 18.04 LTS) and the problem's gone away. This package depends on libsane-hpaio 3.17.10+repack0-5 , which comes with /usr/share/hplip/data/models/models.dat , and the hp-* commands are able to find it:
$ hp-setup stat("/usr/share/hplip/data/models/models.dat", {st_mode=S_IFREG|0644, st_size=1178923, ...}) = 0 openat(AT_FDCWD, "/usr/share/hplip/data/models/models.dat", O_RDONLY) = 23 oversight on my part not to come back to this bug and say "fixed in a newer version" -- You received this bug notification because you are a member of Ubuntu Bugs, which is subscribed to Ubuntu. https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1744340 Title: missing models.dat file To manage notifications about this bug go to: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/hplip/+bug/1744340/+subscriptions -- ubuntu-bugs mailing list ubuntu-bugs@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-bugs