[ Start ] [ Starter Guide ] [ Applications Reference ] [ Developers ] [ Credits ]	Conctact me!

Setup When you open the software for the first time, the Newton Connection Tools Setup window appear with a number of slopes to configure the most important things in this step. In the connection slope, the only possible choose is serial connection; network connection will be avaible when that connection media is implemented. Here you have to select the corresponding COM port and connection speed. The standard speed is 38400 bps, the speed at witch the newton connects with the default "Serial" selection. This software has no speed limit, you can connect at any speed soported by Windows and Newton. Usually, Windows does not support serial connection speeds over 115200 bps but some USB to serial conversors does support it, so it is allowed now. In the General slope you can select the font face and size of the text apearing in the lower side of the connection tool, for the message view. My choose is Garamond with size 12, but may be not avaible on your sistem, or you may not like it, so choose whatever you like. On the lower side, the data section may show no selection avaible or one, the package installation using package manager, depending if you select installing the package manager or not. If that is the case, you can select the operation of the button install: open the dialog to select the file for installing or start the Newton Package Manager. The other selections are only avaible when your newton is connected, and allows you to configure the behavoir of the backup operation. Backing up your data upon connection may be a good idea, not only to have your data safe, but because all Newton Connection Tools applications works directly with the backup file to have a faster access to the Newton information. That way, they only have to check wich stores are present on the Newton Device. After the first backup, sucesive backups are really faster, and should not present a big delay in the connection step. The slope RTF Conversion allows you to select the fonts that will be used as equal when moving documents from the Newton to Windows and vice versa. Windows font are grouped by font families, selecting the six most important families. Also, Newton font considered are only the four default system fonts. Last slope is where you see the licenses you have loaded in your Newton Connection Tools that allows certain Newton Devices to connect using this software. You can load as many licenses as you like. As a technical note, this licenses are stored in a text file in the same folder where you installed the Newton Connection Tools, named "Newton.lic". After the first setup, the second time you open the setup window, it will show a new slope: Plugins. Here will be listed the Import, Export and Synchronization plugins. You can enable or disable this plugins and call its configuration windows. Operation Upon connection, Newton Connection Tools window will look like this: Text has been added to identify each operation. Usualy, this identification appears when you pass with your mouse over each operation. Synchronization does the job of calling each synchronization plugin registred and enabled in the connection tools. With this release, the Outlook Synchronization plugin is distributed. When you press synchronization button with this plugin installed, Outlook Synchornization will take efect. If you have many synchronization plugins installed and enabled, they will be called one after the other. Package install is focused on the idea of downloading new packages to the Newton Device. Usualy it will show a file selection window, allowing you to select a newton package and installing in the Newton Device. Now, if you have the Package Manager installed, you can also make this button launch Package Manager for package installation. Keyboard passtrought is the option to use you desktop keyboard to write things in your Newton Device. You can pass every key to your Newton Device, even function (F1 up to F12) and arrow keys. Newton Restore allows you to restore a previous Newton backup. If you have allready backup your data with the Newton Connection Tools, it will show you a list of previous backup with some data of each, sorted by newton store and backup date. If there is no previous backup, it will show a file open window to select the backup file you want to. You can see a screenshot of this window here. Newton Backup is one of the most complex operation, and also one of the critical one to ensure the safety of your data. It starts a Newton backup but only from soups information. It does not backup newton packages, because there is a bug with this operation in Newton devices. The first time it makes a complete Newton backup, but the second time is allows a selective backup. Selective backup options can be saved to use always the same options. You can see exctly what is backed up using the Newton Backup Viewer tool. One important thing to note here, is that backup files are not encripted, not locked for any specific device use. I prefered this way of operation in order to allow an easier Newton application development. Try to make sure your computer; if you share it with people you don't trust, install the Newton Connection Tools in a folder not visible to any other user. Import/Export documents is a simple interface for calling import/export plugins. You select the desired operation (import or export), the application with wich to work and the specific document traslator for the case. When you import data in your newton device, you only have to drag and drop your file in the window. When exporting documents, simply drag the document from the list and drop it in the desired Windows folder. You can see a screenshot of the import/export window here. Applications launcher is a very simple window, with the purpose of making faster and easier to launch a Newton application. You can select it from the list, and press the launch button; write its name until it is selected and press enter; and so on. It does not interact with the application nor expects any specific interface, it only launch it, as you can do it by double clicking its icon in a Windows folder. Contextual menu From the contextual menu you can start the same operations. Also you can directly start applications. A diference is that here Install... always opens the file selection window for package selection, and if you have the Package Manager installed you launch it from here. You can also open the Newton information window and the setup window for configuration purposes and license information management. You can open it by clicking on the main window with the right mouse button. When an operation is taking place, the main window buttons will be disabled, and so will be the contextual buttons, except for applications that do not depend on the current task, like Setup and Package Manager launching.