Future MessagePads

Gloom and doom for the Newton MessagePad? Or would a MacOS-based MessagePad be good for future MessagePad users?

Let's look at the possibilities, the probabilities, and what might be really good for the future of the MessagePad.

A future MessagePad running Photoshop? It could happen...

Considering the recent announcements regarding the death of the Newton OS, we're concerned with the attitude of the "Chicken Littles" assuming that Apple may be doing a "bad" thing, assuming that the MessagePad itself has been killed.

Having been involved with the Newton industry as Newton software publishers and developers since 1993, we (WalletWare, Inc. and Balcones Software) feel compelled to attempt to shed some positive light on what Apple may be attempting to do in the handheld and palm PC industry. And if our guesses are correct, it's not all bad, folks!!

One of us got a call recently from a principal from yet another Newton-based company. They were worried about the future of the MessagePad and their business that was based on the continued existence of Apple's handheld technology and wanted to know our opinion on what was going on. After spending a half hour on the phone discussing what Apple might be doing with the MessagePad, we convinced them that the future may not be all that bleak.

And after reading all the gloom and doom letters on the internet, we feel that it's time to lay out all the possibilities for everyone to explore. Although Apple is not in a position to make any public announcements regarding their plans for the MessagePad, Apple did not deny that the ideas presented here are very real possibilities. Frankly, we don't believe any decisions have been made regarding the eMate and MessagePad -- even at the highest levels of the company. So please understand that no one at Apple has explicitly approved or endorsed the publishing of this letter as no public commitment has been made by the senior officials at Apple. The ideas in this letter are strictly from WalletWare, Inc. and Balcones Software -- Apple has made no public comment to validate (or deny) any of these future possibilities for the eMate and MessagePad. Also note that we have had no discussions with Qualcomm, Netscape, Adobe, FileMaker, or Iomega regarding any of their product plans. So any mention of future versions or hypothetical graphics of their products depicted in this article are strictly concocted from our imagination and are not condoned by their respective companies.

You've probably read Apple's recent press release regarding no further Newton OS development by Apple Developers.

But what if the rumors were true about an Allegro Lite running on handheld devices? And what if Apple were able to port a "lite" version of the MacOS to a MessagePad? Would this be a bad replacement for the Newton OS? And would MessagePad owners like or hate this? Obviously, NewtonOS lovers would be appalled, but what of the thousands of MessagePad users that love the MessagePad, love the Newton apps, love the greatest and latest handwriting recognition capabilities on their MessagePad, but really don't care what OS it is running on (or maybe they really do care, but more on that in a minute). And how about the approximately 50 million Mac users that have yet to take the plunge into buying a handheld device? Most Mac users today are turning to the Palm Pilot for their handheld solutions, not the Newton MessagePad. What would it take to get those 50 million customers to buy an Apple-made handheld or palm-sized computer without giving it a second thought?

Putting a Mac-lite OS on the MessagePad might make a lot of sense. Let's look at what MessagePad users would gain from this strategy.

More software. A lot more software.

The success of a computer platform is tied very strongly to the quantity and quality of the software that runs on that platform. There were approximately 100 Newton developers recently writing Newton software. Even fewer than that writing commercial applications for the Newton -- most are shareware. And the number of retail stores that carry Newton software has been diminishing since 1994 when the number of Newton retail stores was at an all time high. The size of the Newton developer community for commercial applications had not changed much in 5 years. There are a lot of new players, but there are as many old players that have abandoned the platform since 1993. For the Newton OS to grow, Apple would have had to attract a lot more Newton developers than they ever did. But there were three hurdles involved in attracting new Newton developers to that platform:

1. The Newton API. As with all different operating systems, potential Newton developers had to learn the Newton API. The manual for all of these programming commands was over 1300 pages long (the Newton Programmers' Reference for Newton 2.0.) And that's just for Newton 2.0. The Newton 2.1 manual added another 388 pages.

2. The Newton Language. Most programmers going from one operating system to another don't have to learn a new language, just a new API (as in the Windows API, the Newton API, or the Mac API). Most commercial developers today write their programs in either C, C++, or BASIC. There are literally hundreds of thousands of professional programmers that know one or more of these three languages. Palm Pilot software, the all-but-defunct Magic Cap software, and Windows CE software are almost always written in C or C++. But on the Newton, programmers of commercial applications had to learn a new programming language as well: NewtonScript. Though there was a C++ compiler available for the Newton OS, NewtonScript had to be used for the user interface. So knowledge of the NewtonScript language was still normally required to create a commercial-level Newton application.

3. The Newton development tools. Newton developers not only had to learn a new API and a new language, but also become familiar with an entirely new set of development tools: the Newton Toolkit. Palm Pilot developers could use the well-known Metrowerks development system. And there are thousands of Metrowerks customers that knew how to use these tools. So there is no learning curve for these programmers regarding the tools they need to develop Palm Pilot applications. Windows CE programmers can use the familiar (and ubiquitous) Visual C++ programming environment to develop their Windows CE applications. If the MessagePad ended up with a Mac-based OS on it, then developers would most likely be able to use their familiar Metrowerks development system to create applications for the MessagePad.

So what does all this mean? If you eliminate the barriers to most programmers who might wish to write applications for the MessagePad (i.e. learning a new OS API, learning a new language, and learning new programming tools), then there likely be more MessagePad developers. More developers means more software. More software choices for a Mac-based MessagePad would be more desirable for future MessagePad owners than the current choices of software packages available for the Newton OS.

The number of professional Newton developers seems to have stayed about the same over the last 5 years. More were constantly coming on board, but just about as many were dropping out of the Newton development race each year. The number seemed to remain around a 100 (and that might be a liberal estimate). On the other hand, there are thousands of Mac developers out there with thousands of commercial applications. Many Mac C and C++ software packages could be ported to a Mac MessagePad very quickly since stripping out code is usually easier than adding new code. Furthermore, the thousands of Mac programmers with years of Mac programming experience could crank out new programs just for the MessagePad at a rate that would amaze any current Newton MessagePad owner.

Much existing code from currently published Mac utilities could easily be ported to a MacLite OS, such as the Stuffit Engine, and Adobe Acrobat Reader. And some of the many web page publishing software packages, such as Claris Home Page, could be quickly ported as well. With a few interface design changes and perhaps stripping out some existing code, these products might be made available to run on future MessagePads.

Now Contact from Qualcomm might look like this on a future Mac-based MessagePad

Artists and publishers would love this new device if Apple builds it with a color screen. Imagine a Photoshop Lite or Pocket Freehand. Artists could do their work using a pen instead of a mouse, and at any location whenever they feel inspired (or on location at a client's site).
Musicians would drool over a midi Mac-based device for under $900 that was small enough to slip into their jacket pocket, yet powerful enough to run Pocket Performer in a recording studio or live performance. Or having an inexpensive 16 track digital recording studio and midi controller in their pocket, a la DigiDesign's Pro Tools running on a MessagePad!

School teachers would love a handheld MessagePad running ClarisWorks Lite or Pocket FileMaker that was sharing an attendance file located on their desktop Mac in the front office via diffuse infrared. Or accessing the school's testing and scoring servers through AppleTalk Remote Access using their handheld Mac-based MessagePads. Or using a lite version of Claris Impact to do classroom presentations in full color with a device they can carry with them wherever they go.

A version of Netscape Communicator would probably be ported to these devices since it would be easier to do than porting it to the Newton OS. Qualcomm, the new owners of Now Contact and Now Up-To-Date, could port their software to these Mac handheld devices (instead of simply creating a Contact synchronizing utility as Now did for the Newton OS). Perhaps Qualcomm might someday reconsider their recent decision to license and bundle the Palm Pilot OS with their line of digital cellular phones, especially if the Mac MessagePad software products surpassed the quantity and quality of what is available for the Pilot.

If Apple ported AppleScript to this Mac MessagePad, thousands of existing scripts would run unchanged on these new devices.

Consider the enjoyment of having your favorite Mac software titles running on a handheld or palm-top MessagePad.

More hardware.

MessagePad owners: imagine the luxury of having access to either Mac- or Windows-based floppy disks, PC Cards, ZIP drives or Jaz drives. It would be much easier to port the drivers for these devices from the Mac than to create new device drivers for the Newton OS. Video drivers, modem drivers, printer drivers, ADB hardware device drivers could easily be ported. Newton based MessagePad owners can only dream about such features and capabilities for the currently available Newton-based devices as the market continues to be too small to attract large developers to write these types of drivers from scratch. PowerBook owners would be able to use the same storage PC Card they use with their PowerBooks on their Mac-based MessagePads. And IR connectivity between MessagePads and other Mac computers would (finally) be seamless.

One of the biggest questions we can't answer yet is whether Apple would be able to port a lite version of the MacOS to other processors, such as the latest StrongARM processor. Even the lowest voltage PowerPC chip in a MessagePad would seem a strain on the 'AA' batteries, but Apple may have some solutions to this problem already planned. Or perhaps if they rewrote a very slimmed down version of the MacOS as Microsoft did with Windows CE, it wouldn't take long to port it to other low voltage RISC processors, such as the MIPS, the SH3, or the StrongARM. As John Miller of Balcones Software points out in a similar letter, much of MacOS QuickTime code has already been ported to another platform -- so that code should already be fairly portable. Apple may already have other significant portions of MacOS code that are portable for other processors as well. So this may be more feasible today than it would have been back in 1993 when the Newton OS was originally unveiled.

Should Apple choose to port the MacOS to the MessagePad, porting commercial third party Mac software may or may not be a simple re-compile for developers. In any case, it would be considerably easier than rewriting the software for the currently available Newton-based devices. This is similar to the model Microsoft is using with their new Windows CE operating system. Having had some experience in porting a product to Windows CE, we believe that Microsoft's strategy will be effective in the long run. It will become increasingly important for Apple to make it easier for Mac developers to create MessagePad applications from their existing software.

More users.

If there are more software and hardware products for these hypothetical Mac-based MessagePads, it would be easier for Apple to attract more customers to the MessagePad. If there are more users, then more developers would want to write software for these devices, creating a larger choice of software, which in turn leads to more users. The more software available for the MessagePad, the more MessagePad owners will appreciate the value of their MessagePads. In order for Mac MessagePad applications to get written quickly, we hope and expect that Apple will ensure that third party developers won't have to develop a completely different version of their existing Mac applications. We would hope this will happen "right out of the gate."

There are probably somewhere between 100,000 and 200,000 active Newton MessagePad users in the world today. There may be more, but Apple has released no figures and has kept this number very secret over the last five years. Though many more Newton devices have been sold over the years, a significant number of users upgrade their MessagePads each time a new model comes out. Those that don't upgrade their MessagePads have traditionally been dropping out of the market (witness the number of people still using an original MessagePad, a Sharp ExpertPad or a MessagePad 100!)

Compare the possible 200,000 Newton users with 30 to 50 million Macintosh users in the world today. It's safe to say the the majority of Mac users buying handheld devices today aren't buying Newton devices. They're buying Palm Pilots. We believe this trend would reverse should a Mac-based MessagePad be built and sold for under $800. We would predict that perhaps millions of Mac users would flock to such devices if future versions of their existing Mac software products would run on these devices (as easily as they do on their PowerBook laptops). Having AppleTalk Remote Access, File Sharing with hard drive icons on a Finder desktop, a familiar Mac interface, and the ability to run thousands of Mac software titles on a MessagePad would make any Mac user think twice about buying a Palm Pilot -- especially if Apple went one step further and created a Pilot-sized MessagePad based on the Mac OS.

Lower costs.

More users means higher volumes, and that can significantly reduce the cost of these devices. Furthermore, if Apple can switch to a single OS within the company (Mac-based with many flavors, as Microsoft did with Windows NT and Windows CE), then they could leverage their OS development costs and produce a less expensive MessagePad than if they had to maintain a separate Newton OS development team. So a move to a Mac-based MessagePad or eMate may actually result in lower costs for the purchasers of these devices.

A hypothetical Mac MessagePad running Netscape
But what about screen size? MessagePad screens are so much smaller than Mac screens. Who would want a Mac program running on such a small device?

Newton owners that upgraded their older MessagePads to a MessagePad 2000 or 2100 not only got a slightly larger screen (from about 3" x 4.5" on the MessagePad 130 to about 3.5" x 5" on the MessagePad 2000), but they actually got almost double the screen space as the resolution on the MessagePad was raised to 100 dpi. We suspect Apple could increase the resolution to the point that the screen could be almost a VGA width, yet still keep the current form factor. Smaller MessagePads (Palm PC or Palm Pilot sized MessagePads) would have a harder time running some Mac software, but the Mac user interface has always been much more scalable than virtually any other operating system. Porting software packages to a smaller screen would be much easier for most Mac software packages than most Windows software packages. See some of the hypothetical Mac-based MessagePad graphics on the margins of this web page.

But what about the current Newton users? Aren't they going to lose everything they've invested in Newton software?

Though we can't speak for all other Newton software developers, here at WalletWare we would most likely jump at the opportunity to rewrite our current ExpensePlus product for these new MessagePad devices, and offer to our 25,000+ users a reasonable fee to upgrade ExpensePlus to the Mac-based MessagePad. If the rest of the Newton software industry did this (and they would if their customers expressed an interest in a Mac MessagePad version of their product), then Newton users would not lose their investment in their Newton software.

After porting ExpensePlus from a Newton MessagePad to a Mac MessagePad, WalletWare could quickly port ExpensePlus from the Mac MessagePad to MacOS based desktops and laptops, producing a standalone expense reporting package for the MacOS (and there are currently no such packages available for the MacOS.) Exchanging data with the desktop Mac would be trivial compared to moving data from the Newton MessagePad to a Mac desktop computer. Both Mac and MessagePad users would benefit.

If companies port their software to a Mac MessagePad, they would probably offer a special price for their existing Mac customers. Many might even bundle it with their desktop Mac software. This could make the transition extremely easy on the pocketbook for owners of Mac software.

So since Apple killed the Newton OS, this doesn't necessarily mean they'll kill the MessagePad or eMate?

Many people do not appreciate the distinction between Newton OS and the MessagePad. The Newton OS is a operating system in much the same way as the MacOS and Windows NT are operating systems. The MessagePad 2100 and eMate 300 are hardware devices that currently run the version 2.1 of the Newton Operating System in much the same way as the PowerBook is a computer that runs the MacOS. Should Apple kill the Newton OS, this does not necessarily mean they'll kill the MessagePad. The hardware could run a different operating system.

It is possible, if unlikely, that Apple could swap operating systems on the MessagePad and keep all the unique characterics of the Newton experience. There is no reason why the Newton handwriting recognition software, Intelligent Assistance, Names, Dates, NewtWorks, and other Newton packages couldn't be designed and written for the MacOS, although this would be unlikely as there are better Mac software packages already in each of these categories with the exception of the handwriting recognition engine. But since Apple owns the "print" handwriting recognition engine on the NewtonOS, these algorithms could probably be ported to a Mac MessagePad.

So even thought the Newton OS is now dead, do not assume that the MessagePad and/or the eMate will be history as well. Apple may simply have other plans for the operating systems running on these devices. And there is some evidence that Apple may be planning just such a significant transition to a Mac MessagePad.

So before the pundits bury the MessagePad along with Apple's burying of the Newton OS, let's step back and examine all the possibilities and consider the choices Apple may make over the next few months and give them a chance to show us what direction they will take. It may turn out that the future of the MessagePad is brighter than ever!

Of course, these are just our opinions...and we could be wrong!

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