Making background for Avi's Backdrop with Newton Press 1.1 for Windows

IMHO, Newton Press could have been a much better, more feature-rich application if it had been allowed to mature. Unfortunately for the Newton Community, that didn't happen. Newton Press for Windows is a very picky, buggy piece of software.

On the other hand, Avi's Backdrop is one of the best Newton apps ever made. Easy to use, stable, feature-rich, and free, I've been using it for over a year on an MP130 and an UMP2k.

Avi's Backdrop has a feature that allows images to be placed in the backdrop, much like the desktop wallpaper on a Windows or MacOS (or Linux/X, or IRIX, or Solaris...) computer. These background images are actually NewtonBooks generated with Newton Press with a few unique options.

In short, this document is meant to be a guide to using a buggy piece of software to create packages for an excellent piece of software.

Step 1: Setting up your system

As stated, Newton Press is picky. Especially with colours (or colors, if you're from the States). It's best to change the colour depth of your display to 8-bit (aka 256 colours). To do this in Win95/8, Right-click on your Desktop, choose Properties, choose the Settings tab, and choose either 8-bit or 256 colours from the Colour Depth picker. Click apply, then OK. Under Windows NT 4.0, the process similar, except you may have to test the mode first.

Step 2: Creating / preparing your images

You'll have to get your images into a certain format to make sure that they look their best on the Newt. For this task, I recommend using Paint Shop Pro, a shareware product almost as feature-rich as Adobe Photoshop. I'm still using the old version, but these instructions should apply for both the old and new (5.03) versions. If you don't want to install Paint Shop Pro, use your favourite image editor / paint program and try to follow my steps as best you can.

  1. Open your file into Paint Shop Pro.
  2. Change the size of the file by going to the Image menu and choosing Resample. (in PSP 5, Resample has been integrated into Resize.) If Resample is greyed out, then choose Resize instead.
  3. Here's where you'll have to decide what platform and/or orientation you want your background image to work under. Here are my suggested sizes:
    MP 120/130 MP2000/2100/eMate
    Portrait (LxW) 240x320 320x480
    Landscape (LxW) 320x240 480x320
    Both (LxW) 320x320 480x480
    The best way to get close to these sizes is to make sure the Maintain Aspect Ratio box is checked, and then enter in one of the appropriate pixel sizes listed above. If PSP changes the other value to something less than what you're shooting for, then you'll be able to see all of your image and the image won't look distorted on screen. Anyways, choose your values and click OK.
  4. Next, we have to change the image to greyscale. This is by far the easiest operation: go to the Colors menu and choose Grey Scale.
  5. Now, we have to reduce the colour depth to a value appropriate to the Newton we are using. We do this from the Decrease Color Depth submenu in the Colors menu. If you're making this for a MP 120/130, choose 2 colors (1 bit), change the reduction method to Error diffusion (leave everything else the same) and click OK. If you don't like those results, hit Ctrl-Z to undo, then go back to Decrease Colour Depth, but instead of choosing Error diffusion, try Ordered dither.

    If you're making this for an MP 2000/2100/eMate, choose 16 colors (4 bit), and accept the defaults.
  6. Lastly, we need to save the image into a new file. From the File menu, choose Save As... Type a filename with an extension of .BMP (for example, mycat.bmp) and in the Save as Type picker choose Windows or OS/2 bitmap (*.BMP). Click on the Options button and make sure that we're making a Windows bitmap with RGB encoding. Save the file.

Step 3: Creating the Newton Book

Finally, fire up Newton Press. It will show a blank, new file by default. We need to set some things up so that Avi's Backdrop can use it as a background image. First, from the Edit menu, choose Preferences. Under platform, choose the appropriate platform that you're developing for. Don't use either of the 2-Up formats or the Universal format. For an MP 120/130, use Classic. Click OK, Now under the Book menu, choose Title. Change the icon to whatever you want, and type a title. Click the More Choices button, and replace the Unique ID (ISBN) with "A!:" without the quotes. Change the rest of the fields to whatever you wish. Click OK. Now from the file menu, click Add, find the image file you want to use, and click Open. Newton Press will import your image and it will display in the window. Don't worry if the colours look strange. Save the file with whatever name you wish, create the package, and install it onto your Newton.

Step 4: Setting up Avi's Backdrop

In Avi's Backdrop, tap on the "i" button, then tap on Prefs. In the Prefs slip, tap on the Background Picker button. You should see the name of the book you just created listed. Tap it, then close the slip and you should see your background picture in all its glory! (You may have to drag the note area down to make the image visible.)