RDCL on Windows
I just tried out the latest one click installer for Ruby 1.9, and it seems that the RDCL works out of the box 
I am using a generic USB to serial converter with the common Prolific PL 2303 chip, and after correctly setting the parameters, I could connect to my Newton without problems.
It's great to see that Ruby 1.9 is slowly becoming more mainstream, and that installation is nowadays quite easy!
Patch 710031 and 71J059
One quick but important note: The 71J059 patch is not compatible with patch 710031 which Paul Guyot has created. I'm not sure about the reason, but before applying the 71J059 patch, the 710031 patch needs to be removed with the 717260 Install Override patch (it's contained in the 71J059 patch ZIP file).
The Patch is out
I released the Y2010 patch for US MP2100 models yesterday, and hope to be able to work on the German model, the MP2000 and the eMate next. That requires reverse engineering the respective base batches for those models, and I decided to automate this a little bit. I started adding some functionality to the RDCL to read package files. If you have followed the RDCL development recently, you might have noticed that I also started putting together a simple Qt-based wrapper application for the nwt command line tool, to make operations like installing or syncing easier.
Patch Preparations
If you have subscribed to the RSS feed for Mottek, you might have noticed that not only these posting appear, but also all other changes I do to the 40Hz site. Makes it easier to follow what I'm up to I'm mentioning this because I'm about to release the patch for the year 2010 problem for the Newton. So don't be confused if you see items about the related web pages appear in the news feed.
RDCL to the rescue
I recently got a new Mac mini to start playing around with Leopard-only software like MacRuby, and moved most of my day-to-day files and programs. The problem is of course that Leopard does not come with Classic, and apps like NCU won't run.
Fortunately, the RDCL library and tools work quite nicely, and after downloading Ruby 1.9, I was able to get first my address book in vCard format onto the Mac (using IC/VC), as well as some other important notes. There's still lots to be done in terms of converting data (ink and drawings would be great), but it's a good start!
Blast from the past
I added now also the Mottek archive from 2003 onwards to the MoinMoin setup, so happy digging into really old stuff 
I should soon be able to get back to the year 2010 fix.
If you can read this ...
in your feed reader, then also the migration of the Mottek blog to MoinMoin has worked. Just as a reminder, the RSS feed now lives at http://40hz.org/Pages/40Hz?action=rss&unique=1, but the old links should still work as well. I'll convert the old blog entries prior to 2005 very soon as well.
Work on the Newton's Y2010 fix has not stalled, but I want to make sure that I put in all the necessary safeguards to not cause more problems than the fix would solve. The main problem is that there's no way to unpatch a Newton unless you have a ROM board for a different language, or an eMate's ROM board.
Moin, Moin
I'm in the process of changing the backed of 40Hz.org from MediaWiki to MoinMoin to be able combine the web pages and the blog. Some hiccups are to be expected, so please bear with me I'll try to put redirects into place so that external links still work.
John Arkley was wrong
Just to make it clear: Despite reports to the contrary, it is possible to create NewtonOS patches. It's not for the faint of heart, and you need a german and a US ROM board to erase broken patches, but statements like "Apple is the only one who has the tools to build a new System Update," and "Building and testing a System Update is complex and expensive process and no single engineer could do it" are plain wrong. The proof is on SourceForge for a simple test patch I created as the start for fixing the 2010 problem, and on UNNA for a more elaborate patch Paul Guyot has put together.
The real challenge is not so much creating a patch, but knowing what to patch and how.
Patch day
The Newton's Y2010 problem would best be solved with a low level patch which kicks in very early in the boot process. I have played around now for a while with the patching mechanisms, and got a nice pile of information gathered. I got a great start with the work done by Kip (Jonathan Knight), who reverse engineered the original 717260 patch by Apple and uploaded it to UNNA.
I created some test patches, and while it is a bit complicated, I was able to add new code to an existing patch, patch previously unpatched functions, remove patches completely, and change existing NewtonScript functions. In the process, I managed to disable one of my Newtons (I patched a function in the startup phase), but that should be reversible by changing the ROM temporarily, that will erase all patches.