Newton Poetry

Tai Shimizu, a photo blogger, got his hands on a Newton MessagePad 2100 and posted his initial thoughts – along with some gorgeous isolated pictures of his new gadget.

Shimizu seems most impressed with the handwriting recognition capabilities and the user interface:

The UI of the Newton feels saturated with innovation, even when compared to new devices. The idea of the notepad being the centerpiece of the device is not only vastly different than current UI paradigms, but extremely useful due to the addition of the assist functionality.

The pictures, like the one above, are great.

The Worldwide Newton Conference 2009 took place over a week ago in Vancouver, BC, and John Coady at the NewtonTalk list offers his observations from the weekend’s festivities:

Larry Yaeger gave us a fascinating glimpse into the development of the Newton and, of course, the work that he spearheaded on the second generation print recognizer – which was based on the use of artificial neural networks – that made Newton OS 2.x so incredibly better than the original (non-Apple) version. We were shown some of the original Newton prototypes and development/testing equipment (I hope that one day these end up in a suitable exhibit in Apple’s own museum). Larry then took us on a short stroll into Polyworld where he currently explores the further application of neural networks, and their various properties, in artificial life systems (to me it looks just like a straight extension of his work on the Newton!!!).

Sounds like a blast, despite the low turnout.

I couldn’t make it, unfortunately, but WWNC organizer Ryan Vetter has posted materials from the conference at the WWNC 2009 site.

[Ed. note: I had “Dennis Coady” when it should have been “John Coady.” Sorry about that, John!]

With Eckhart Köppen’s Newtpocalypse patch for the eMate complete, I thought I’d install it and see how it performs on my own Newton eMate.

First, though, I downloaded the new Classilla browser for OS 9. This variation of the old Mozilla browser is getting a lot of attention, and deservedly so. Development on iCab has ceased, and many of the Classic Mac browsers do a poor job of rendering modern web sites.

As a test, I used Classilla to navigate Köppen’s 40Mhz.org site, where he posts his Newton projects, and download the patch from Sourceforge.

It’s easy to install Köppen’s patch. In fact, it’s nothing more than a simple package installation with an automatic reset added at the end. You can either use the Classic Mac installation methods, using Newton Connection Utilities, or the modern NCX or various other OS X-based Newton apps.

I’m using Newton Connection Utilities on an iMac G3 running OS 9, and connecting with a serial-to-USB dongle.

First, download your specific patch file from Köppen’s 40Mhz.org site. As you see above, you’ll have a few options on which patch to download. In my case, I need the 73J186 version.

Above you see that my eMate is running Newton OS 2.1, version 737041. This is the part that’s going to change.

To install Köppen’s Patch 73J186, head to Newton Connection Utilities (on OS 9, or another package installer on OS X) and pick your patch version (above).

Your package installer will upload the patch to your Newton.

After the patch is done installing, your Newton will reset on its own.

After the restart, my eMate shows the Newton OS 2.1, version 73J186 (the same as the patch version) is installed and up to date.

That’s it. And so far, after running my eMate through a battery of high-powered tests (like turning it on and scribbling some notes), everything is hunky-dorey. Bring on 2010.

How did your patching process turn out?

Morgan Aldridge at Makkintosshu points to МУЗЕЙ APPLE NEWTON, a Russian site devoted to the MessagePad. There’s a page for each of the Newton models, OMP through the eMate, with technical descriptions for each, as well as a video, photos, and original Newton documentation.

It’s a good idea to run the site through Google Translate (Russian > English) so you could read the text.

“A beautifully designed museum site for Apple Newtons in Russian,” Aldridge says. “Especially excellent device photography as well.”

He’s right: some of the close up eMate shots are spectacular.

Morgan Aldridge has added the Newton MessagePad 2100 and eMate 200 to gdgt.com, “a place to get to know your gadgets even better.”

gdgt.com is a gadget social site, allowing users to “own” or “want” different gadgets, as well as rate them, give tips, and share their device collection.

The lineup also includes the OMP, MP110-130, and MP2000 models.

Hip hop hurray.

Newton savior Eckhart Köppen announced yesterday that the Newton eMate and German MessagePad 2100 Year 2010 patches are complete and ready for installation. These patches fix the dreaded Newtpocalypse on Newton OS 2.1 models.

Be sure to download the Y2010 patches at Köppen’s Sourceforge.net project page.

I’ll be running the patch on my own eMate, and will post a breakdown when it’s complete. In the meantime, if you have an MP2x00 or eMate, run these patches yourself and report back to Köppen if you face any troubles.

The entire Newton community appreciates Köppen’s work on this. Thanks to him, and all the volunteers who test the patches, our Newtons will keep running for the foreseeable future.

Eckhart Köppen is looking for testers for his eMate and German MP2100 Year 2010 patch. He says on his blog:

The Y2010 patches for the eMate and German MP2100 are ready, and they seem to work fine here, but I’d still like to give them more testing. Like with the first Y2010 patch, I’m looking for people who can either risk bricking a Newton (with me unbricking it), or who have access to a US MP2x00 to unbrick a Newton themselves via a ROM board swap. Note that I don’t expect any unbricking to be necessary, but you never know.

If you have a spare eMate or Deutschland MessagePad, you can help prevent Newtpocalypse.

What you’re looking at is the high crest of some Mac appreciation wave that is only now breaking.

I posted my Apple.com, circa 1983 picture on June 29 – three days after sharing it on Flickr. Since then, the image has been shared on numerous blogs (including one of my daily reads), and has spread around the world. It’s been an honor to see how this little project took off.

To give you an idea, Newton Poetry typically earns anywhere from 300-700 hits on an average day. For those days that I publish something to Macsurfer, that number can reach into 1,000 or so. But that’s only happened a few times.

Hitting 3,600 hits in a day, however, is unheard of for this blog. It’s madness. And it’s humbling.

The funny thing is, I had a feeling it was coming. Something told me that drafting a snapshot of Apple’s make-believe 1983 web site, something I hadn’t seen anyone tackle before, would be something people could enjoy. But 43,000 views and 30 comments on Flickr (and counting) tells me it reached those Mac fans, like myself, that love the retro kitsch stuff.

Here I thought the first day’s traffic, that little spike you see on the left, was big news. Then things creeped down back to normal, when Cult of Mac wrote about it and – BOOM – off it went. My biggest source of traffic has come from some German web sharing service Swedish blog network that I’ve never heard of. Amazing.

Looking at it almost a month later, there’s some things that I would change about the mockup. For one, someone pointed out that I had the wrong Apple II at the bottom. I’d like to mess with the kerning a bit on the headlines.

Also, some have suggested that I should have used Apple’s old serif font (what would become a modified version of Garamond) for the typeface. But I hate that typeface, and I wanted to keep things simple and more modern. Besides, the picture was thrown together on a Thursday night, the product of an idea and some Google Image searching, and is by no means an accurate representation. It only shows what one could do with Apple’s iconic web site design.

Most of all, my little project has shown the power of the share-able web. After I posted the mockup and Twittered it, the thing spread immediately to blogs and re-Tweets, and started generating unheard-of levels of traffic to this site.

So thanks to everyone who chimed in, shared the picture, and visited this site. I hope some of you will stick around, because I do love me some classic Macintosh, and Newton, and am willing to do more of this kind of thing.

I have a Newton launch day version of Apple.com swimming in my head as I type.

Martin Hahn, developer of SBM Utilities for the Newton, has released the application (ZIP file) he uses to create registration codes for the app, essentially unlocking the app for all to use. Via Frank Gruendel at PDA Soft is hosting the file.

Hahn at Softwarebüro Müller has created many other packages for the Newton, including Icon Editor and Soup Transport.

[Via Newtontalk.]

Perhaps you’ve noticed, but things have been a little slow here at Newton Poetry. Lately I’ve relied on quotes and other bloggers’ posts to fill my quota of three posts or so a week.

I will say that I’ve had a few large, ongoing projects that have filled my time. It’s also worth noting that Newton news, such as it is, has been sparse these past few months – with the exception of the 2010 Patch.

Writing about the Newton has a built-in challenge: there’s not much new to report.

But Newton Poetry has always been as much about Mac projects as Newton ones. In that case, I’ll mention that I’ve been pinching my project pennies to save for a new Macintosh when OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard is released. My goal is to buy a pretty, shiny new iMac. As a result, I’ve cut back on my eBay spending. This hobby ain’t cheap.

Many readers have asked me about some sort of post on getting a Newton hooked up to a wireless Network. That has always been a goal of mine, and as soon as it becomes a reality, I’ll post it to this site. Going wifi with a Newton is right up there with connecting it to OS X. If you’re going to use the Newton in the modern world, the thinking goes, it just makes sense to get a wireless connection.

Also on my to-do list is to do more Newton projects in a Windows-based environment. Windows users outnumber Mac users by degrees upon degrees, and certainly there’s an audience out there that would benefit from a few Microsoft-based posts. Just know that I’ll be doing it holding my nose.

Stories on handwriting recognition and the unification of the smartphone/PDA are of interest to the Newton user, if only for history’s sake, so you’ll see that kind of stuff as usual. And I’m always finding Mac tidbits to share and comment on. One subject I find fascinating is the world of backups and archiving, both on the Mac and on the Newton. Look for more posts on those, and other subjects, as time goes on.

When I look at my goals for Newton Poetry, many have been checked off the big to-do list: buying an eMate, connecting with OS X, giving this site a self-hosted domain, and archiving long-lost Newton web sites. I’m proud of each one.

It’s always good to have a few more goals, however, just to keep things fresh. If you have any suggestions or requests other than the ones I have listed, please let me know in the comments.