[NTLK] New Einstein Release v2026.10.23

[Matthias Melcher]

Hello friends,

this is quite a big pre-release for Einstein. A ton of things were fixed. Your feedback is greatly appreciated, so I can prepare the main release.

ALL THE FOLLOWING FIXES ARE TESTED ON THE FLTK RELEASE
The Cocoa release is here to keep the history of the first Einstein release, but it is not actively maintained.

REMOVE THE Y2K10 PATCH
If your Flash file contain the Y2K10 or Y2K25 patch, you should remove it and let Einstein handle time and date information for you. To remove, back up your data, start a new Flash file, apply the latest Apple bug fixes (Help > Install Essentials...), then restore your data.

TL;DR:

- many bugs were fixed in communication and time management including Y2K25
- Emate is now supported much better, screen rotation, special keys, etc.
- screen rotation is fixed
- quick start stores emulation in sleep mode and restarts without rebooting
- Alarms now work
- Einstein should support Windows 7 again

As usual, enjoy!

 - Matthias
> v2026.10.23 <https://github.com/pguyot/Einstein/releases/tag/v2026.10.23>
> Repository: pguyot/Einstein <https://github.com/pguyot/Einstein> · Tag: v2026.10.23 <https://github.com/pguyot/Einstein/tree/v2026.10.23> · Commit: a695823 <https://github.com/pguyot/Einstein/commit/a6958239e6ac1f5d30800e9f4105201e5889d3ed> · Released by: github-actions[bot] <https://github.com/apps/github-actions>
> Binary Release v2026.10.23
> 
> User Release Notes
> 
> The Newton goes to sleep again. Since January 2025, alarms that NewtonOS
> sets for itself were set to a date in 1993, went off at once, and woke
> the Newton every time it tried to sleep. Einstein now counts the
> NewtonScript time from 2024, which is good until January 2041.
> The date fix (Y2K10) now works for all four ROMs: U.S. and German
> MessagePads, eMate 300 and Watson. Before, only the U.S. ROM showed the
> right date; the others showed 1996.
> Help › Install Essentials offers Apple's System Update for each ROM
> (U.S. 717260, German 747260, eMate 737246; there is none for Watson)
> instead of the Y2K10 patch packages. Don't install a Y2K10 patch
> package: it replaces Einstein's fix with an older one, and the Newton
> no longer goes to sleep. If you installed one, back up your Newton and
> start with a new flash file.
> Windows: the Newton's clock is no longer off by 150 days and one hour.
> Windows: Einstein.exe no longer needs the Visual C++ Redistributable.
> With an older version of it installed, Einstein could crash while the
> Newton was booting.
> Serial port: connections over TCP (for example to NCX or Newton
> Connection), named pipes, pseudo terminals and BasiliskII are much more
> reliable. Data that arrived faster than NewtonOS could read it
> overwrote earlier bytes, so the Newton asked for the same data again and
> again; NCX backups stopped halfway. Einstein now passes data on at about
> the speed of a fast serial line.
> Switching to another serial driver in the Settings or in Einstein Prefs
> now stops the old driver cleanly.
> Switching the serial port back to the Network Client keeps your server
> address and port; before, it went back to 127.0.0.1:3679.
> Fast start: a new version of Einstein starts the Newton normally instead
> of continuing a state that an older version saved. Saved states (File ›
> Save State) still load into a new version.
> Quitting always puts the Newton to sleep first, also with Fast start
> off, so apps save what you are editing. Before, a quit could lose the
> last changes in an open note. (Works on the eMate still saves a document
> only when you leave it, for example with Overview.)
> Screen rotation: when you rotate the Newton's screen, Einstein starts in
> the same rotation next time. After a fast start or when restoring a saved
> state, a rotated screen no longer shows garbled lines.
> eMate 300: the eMate starts in landscape. The screen size in the
> Settings is the size at the start: 320 x 480 for a MessagePad, 480 x 320
> for an eMate; both give an eMate the same screen.
> eMate 300: the Special Keys (close, extras, dock, send, receive, scroll,
> overview, undo, find, assist, light, power) appear as a row of buttons
> under the screen. Turn them off with "Special Keys (eMate)" in the User
> Interface tab of the Settings. On your keyboard, Esc and F1 to F10 do
> the same.
> F11 switches the backlight on or off, F12 presses the power button.
> The German MessagePad, eMate 300 and Watson ROMs no longer ask to
> calibrate the screen.
> Alarms work: alarms and timers go off on time, also while the Newton
> sleeps, which wakes it up. An alarm that came due while Einstein was
> quit shows up at the next start.
> The Newton always uses your computer's time zone, whatever home city
> is set in Time Zones.
> On a new Newton, the Setup Assistant picks a home city in your
> computer's time zone. Before, the city was off by an hour in summer on
> macOS, and in the wrong direction on Windows and Linux.
> macOS: Einstein no longer asks for access to your contacts at every
> launch. It asks when the Newton first wants your name and address, in
> the Setup Assistant.
> Einstein Prefs only offers serial drivers that exist.
> The setting "Fetch date and time from host" is gone; it had no effect.
> The Newton always shows your computer's date and time.
> Developer Release Notes
> 
> The emulated real-time clock counts UTC, as on a real Newton, and no
> longer goes back to 1996 at every boot (all four ROMs). GMTOffset() and
> DaylightSavingsOffset() return the host's time zone, and setting the
> time in NewtonOS no longer changes the clock. Before, the clock ran on
> local time, so alarms were off by the home city's offset and could fire
> in an endless loop.
> The RTC alarm interrupt is emulated: it fires once when the clock
> reaches the alarm register, and wakes a sleeping Newton if the wake-up
> mask (0x0F184800) allows it.
> Documentation/NewtonTime.md describes how NewtonOS keeps the time,
> the ROM addresses of the time patches, how to patch other ROMs and
> physical Newtons, and the 2040 limit of the 32-bit clock.
> The TCP client socket never blocks, also not while connecting, so a quit
> or a driver change is answered at once. A server that does not answer is
> given up after 5 seconds, and Einstein tries again after 3 seconds.
> Maintenance Release Notes
> 
> Windows ARM64 builds again with the static C runtime: FLTK 1.4.5's
> rint() fallback is patched for old MSVC only
> (cmake/PatchFLTKMath.cmake, until FLTK 1.5).
> The unit tests pass on Linux x64, Linux ARM64, Windows and macOS. On
> macOS they hung before main(), waiting for access to the contacts.
> The Cocoa CI workflow builds, tests and archives the app unsigned.
> —
> This release has 4 assets:
> 
> Einstein_macOS_universal_cocoa_v2026.10.23.zip
> Einstein_windows_x64_fltk_v2026.10.23.zip
> Source code (zip)
> Source code (tar.gz)
> Visit the release page <https://github.com/pguyot/Einstein/releases/tag/v2026.10.23> to download them.
> 
> —
> View it on GitHub <https://github.com/pguyot/Einstein/releases/tag/v2026.10.23>