[NTLK] Einstein, last call

Fri Oct 23 13:26:41 PDT 2026

just a quick note, newton-re is C++ not rust
On 23/10/2026 10:41:56 PM, Matthias Melcher <m.melcher at robowerk.de> wrote:
tl;dr: Einstein is mature and needs only bug fixes at this point. It'll always be around to emulate a Newton device as close to the original as possible. newton-re OTOH will allow us to get the full NewtonOS experience without Newton device limitations. It's a whole new world, and it could be a whole new eco system that is worth being a daily driver.
Hi Dan, everyone,
I did get your mail, thank you. This is exactly the input I need. Windows is a bit of a problematic platform for me. I do not have any Windows machine, or any Intel based computers, so I can always only test with virtual machines. For Windows 11, this is bearable, but on a Windows 7 machine, I can't install any of the debugging tools that I would need to find bugs. 32 bit is less and less supported.
I know that Einstein still compiles for 32 bits, for the RaspberryPi for example, but that brings me back to the point: why compile an emulator when you can compile the real code?
So maybe I was not clear enough, or even a bit sensationalist. I'll try to clarify my view. Please let me know if you see this differently, anyone out there of course:
Einstein as an emulator is much slower and need more energy (think mobile devices) than newton-re. OTOH, Einstein is super true to the original device, runs internally at 32 bit, and emulates everything, even the bugs.
I am not saying we abandon Einstein. I am saying it's not worth adding more features. Einstein can do exactly what it was written for. There are always bugs in any software, and they should be fixed. My two-weeks call was meant for exactly that: give me all your bug reports now, and I will see what I can do. I still have one feature up my sleeve, but the important thing is that I want to wrap up Einstein and leave it as an as-good-as-possible mature app for everyone to enjoy.
Now the untold part is still very much up in a thought cloud. With AI, knowing that it takes a week to rewrite NewtonOS pretty much from scratch, the best way forward IMHO - this is very much open for discussion - would be a native NewtonOS (a NewtonOS implementation that runs as if it was specifically made for you Mac, PC, iPhone, Android, whatever, not emulated), whil giving all the interfaces that makes Einstein so convenient.
One option would be to wrap newton-re with a GUI that is similar to Einstein. Another way would be to replce all the ROM code in Einstein with the core of newton-re. A third version would be a complete AI rewrite of NewtonOS in C++ (newton-re is written in Rust), and go from there.
In either case, having native NewtonOS would for example replace NCU/NCX altogether. With a powerfull NewtonOS machine, there is no need to sync anything. The New Newt would be powerful enough to read and write any file format directly. It could sync addresses with your online account itself, read and write thousands of emails, manage your appointments without any external sync ever. We can teach it to read and write modern image and text formats and work as a modern lightweight work platform for ePaper and other pen devices.
I hope this makes more sense now - or did I make this more confusing?
One more thing:
Inspired by Daniel's work, I asked my AI to recreate the original tool setup for when the ROM was developed, and then reimplement C++ methods until they match the ROM binary exactly. A quick test showed that this does work. It would restore the exact ROM by compiling the recreated C/C++ code - or inversely, we would recreate the exact ROM source code from scratch and verify that it indeed is the original code.
This would give us a way to improve and fix the ROM for our original machines using better patches or replacement ROM cards. Technology wise it would sit in between Einstein and newton-re.
So, a lot of planning needed to get an educated decision in the end.
- Matthia
> On 23. Oct 2026, at 07:36, Dan wrote:
>
> You are not the only one. And there are several issues with the latest version. I tried to message Matthias, but I am guessing a spam filter ate them somewhere. One is it seems the newer windows versions do not run on anything but 10 and 11. :( Being that so much of our windows software for newton is older and is run in VM's (NCU, Xport, Press, etc) this is a problem.
>
> Einstein starts, you see the boot screen, hear the chime, if there are installed packages they load, then CRASH/freeze with the boot screen still up. Blank/new internal flash don't make any difference.
>
> I doubt anything can be done considering the current build tools are made with extra effort to block anything older than windows 10 (or at least so I have been told). To make it compatible with older versions I suspect one would need to downgrade said build tools and Microsoft has made that very difficult if not impossible. Perhaps we should ask a AI for better build tools that can make builds that work with older versions of windows as an option. :P
>
> -Dan
>
> On 10/23/2026 12:47 AM, Victor Rehorst wrote:
>> Am I the only one who feels a bittersweet sadness about this? I've sat on this feeling for a day and a half now, and it's not going away, so I'm going to have to inflict it on y'all.
>>
>> The Einstein project has been on two-decade-long[1] journey, that started by proving that this community could take some control and decide what the future was of this platform that we love. And very quickly, it became one of the cornerstones of this community: people gathered around, watching the progress, asking questions, making suggestions, offering encouragement and making any contributions that they could. We celebrated every milestone and each piece of hard-won progress made by analyzing, understanding, documenting, and implementing. There may only be a handful of contributors listed[2], but this entire community has always proudly carried Einstein on its shoulders.
>>
>> To me, something feels wrong about it coming to such an end, deprecated due to the existence of a machine-coded "replacement". Maybe it's because, as a software developer and programmer, I enjoy and appreciate the craft so much, and now there's just nothing to do. I should be happy - "Hooray, everything works now like we planned", but I'm not. Is it just the fallacy of sunken cost[3] irrationally yelling in my head?
>>
>> I'm not sure why, but it feels like there's a bit less to look forward to.
>>
>> If I'm the only one feeling this way, I'll just walk backwards back into my hedge and deal with it. But I'm curious, and I suspect I might not be the only one.
>>
>> -V
>>
>> [1] https://web.archive.org/web/20040908090829/www.wired.com/news/mac/0,2125,64834,00.html
>>
>> [2] https://github.com/pguyot/Einstein/graphs/contributors?all=1
>>
>> [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunk_cost
>>
>> On 2026-10-21 11:04, Matthias Melcher wrote:
>>> There were two or three more features planed for Einstein. However with Daniel's newton-re, there is really no longer a need for the existence of Einstein. newton-re can now run NewtonOS at full speed without emulation and without a ROM. With a matching user interface, it will be far superior to Einstein, performance wise at the least.
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