DateFix 2.0.0-beta.6

Keep your Palm working after 31 December 2031. Sixth beta.

What's new in beta.6

• The application table is data now. The places DateFix patches in applications that draw the year themselves used to be compiled into DateFix. They now come from one text file, apps/apps.txt, built into DateFix as a resource. A newer table can be installed as a small database DateFixApps.pdb (built with make apps) without a new DateFix: DateFix uses whichever valid table is newer, and checks a table completely before using it (a damaged one is ignored and the built-in one used).
• Show Trace names the table in use, e.g. Table 2026100201 (built in).
• tools/yearfinder --table prints the lines for apps/apps.txt directly.
• Date Book+ needs no extra conversion. In the emulator (Palm m515) all Date Book+ entries - appointments, floating events, journal entries, templates, to-dos - end up in the system's DatebookDB and ToDoDB, which DateFix already converts; Date Book+'s own database stays empty. The README said otherwise and is corrected.
• The .prc of this release is built by GitHub Actions from the tagged source (pinned toolchain), and the tests run on macOS and Linux.
• Issue forms for device reports and bugs.

Before you start: make a HotSync backup and insert an SD card if you can. Enabling converts your stored dates; dates before the start year (birthdays before 1932 with the default) are set to its first year. Emergency exit: a soft reset holding the navigator up button starts the Palm without DateFix. Please read the README.

Works on

• Tungsten T3 (Palm OS 5.2.1), Palm m515 (4.1) - tested on the devices
• Handspring Visor (3.5.2H3): the built-in Date Book is right; Date Book+ 3.0H right in every view with the RAM copy (tools/ramcopy)
• Tungsten E2 and Palm m515 in an emulator, including a reminder for 2032 that fires at the 2031/2032 rollover, an entry from 2025 read with the clock in 2033 and the World Clock in 2033

Everything else with Palm OS 5 or 3.5 – 4.x is expected to work but not confirmed - please report your device, Palm OS version and the Test line from DateFix (device report).

Known limitations

• The table has Date Book+ 3.0H and TimeCopy 1.4. Other applications that compute or draw years themselves, and other versions, are not changed.
• The hardware button and alarms start the ROM version of Date Book+, not the RAM copy.
• HotSync with a desktop transfers the internal dates.
• The window is 128 years; Palm OS below 3.5 is not supported.
• Not run on a device: time-dependent games.

Install: HotSync DateFix-2.0.0-beta.6.prc to the Palm, start DateFix, choose the start year, tap Enable, confirm the conversion. To update from an earlier beta use Options → Prepare Update (not Disable), then HotSync the new version.

The SHA-256 is in the attached DateFix-2.0.0-beta.6.prc.sha256.

DateFix 2.0.0-beta.5

Keep your Palm working after 31 December 2031. Fifth beta.

What's new in beta.5

• TimeCopy fixed. TimeCopy 1.4 sets the Palm's clock from the PC after every HotSync. Its conduit sends the PC time as Unix seconds, and the Palm application adds the seconds from 1 January 1970, which DateFix's moved epoch reads as an internal year: the clock ended up one offset too late (2062 instead of 2026 with start year 1940). DateFix now patches that year constant in TimeCopy 1.4 (the Palm application; the Windows conduit stays as it is). After updating, open DateFix once, then HotSync: the clock is right again. TimeCopy's drift statistics are spoilt by the big correction, Clear Stats resets them. Tested in the emulator with simulated conduit data (2054 before, 2026 after), not yet with a real Windows HotSync.

From beta.4 (since beta.2)

• Per-application patches. Applications that draw the year themselves (not through the system's date functions) showed the internal year. DateFix now writes the start year into the year constant of the stored code of applications in a built-in table, so they compute the real year. So far the table has one application: Date Book+ 3.0H (week, two-week and year view). Disable takes the patches out. The Test button shows apps: n, other: n and locked: n.
• ROM applications cannot be patched. For a Handspring Visor (Date Book+ in ROM) there is tools/ramcopy/make_ram_copy.py: it makes a copy of the application's .prc under its own name and creator, which runs from RAM as a second launcher icon ("DB+ (RAM)"). This release contains no copy of Date Book+; you need the .prc of version 3.0H yourself. Confirmed on a Visor (Palm OS 3.5.2H3) and, for the patch itself, on a Palm m515 and a Tungsten E2 in the emulator.
• tools/yearfinder finds the places in an application's code that draw the year, to extend the table.
• Fixed: Prepare Update now names the real offset ("28 years early"), not always 36. The default start year is 1932 (since beta.2).

Before you start: make a HotSync backup and insert an SD card if you can. Enabling converts your stored dates; dates before the start year (birthdays before 1932 with the default) are set to its first year. Emergency exit: a soft reset holding the navigator up button starts the Palm without DateFix. Please read the README.

Works on

• Tungsten T3 (Palm OS 5.2.1), Palm m515 (4.1) - tested on the devices
• Handspring Visor (3.5.2H3): the built-in Date Book is right; Date Book+ 3.0H right in every view with the RAM copy
• Tungsten E2 and Palm m515 in an emulator, including a reminder for 2032 that fires at the 2031/2032 rollover, an entry from 2025 read with the clock in 2033 and the World Clock in 2033

Everything else with Palm OS 5 or 3.5 – 4.x is expected to work but not confirmed - please report your device, Palm OS version and the Test line from DateFix (see the README).

Known limitations

• The patch table has Date Book+ 3.0H and TimeCopy 1.4. Other applications that compute or draw years themselves, and other versions, are not changed.
• Date Book+ keeps its records in its own database; DateFix does not convert them (format unknown). The hardware button and alarms start the ROM version of Date Book+, not the RAM copy.
• HotSync with a desktop transfers the internal dates.
• The window is 128 years; Palm OS below 3.5 is not supported.
• Not run on a device: time-dependent games.

Install: HotSync DateFix-2.0.0-beta.5.prc to the Palm, start DateFix, choose the start year, tap Enable, confirm the conversion. To update later use Options → Prepare Update (not Disable), then HotSync the new version.

SHA-256: 0f24ac540e238fb5098fe2363b3f072d135fc5a14489e439a2a18a989c98a3a2

DateFix 2.0.0-beta.4

Keep your Palm working after 31 December 2031. Fourth beta.

What's new in beta.4 (since beta.2; beta.3 was never released)

• Per-application patches. Applications that draw the year themselves (not through the system's date functions) showed the internal year. DateFix now writes the start year into the year constant of the stored code of applications in a built-in table, so they compute the real year. So far the table has one application: Date Book+ 3.0H (week, two-week and year view). Disable takes the patches out. The Test button shows apps: n, other: n and locked: n.
• ROM applications cannot be patched. For a Handspring Visor (Date Book+ in ROM) there is tools/ramcopy/make_ram_copy.py: it makes a copy of the application's .prc under its own name and creator, which runs from RAM as a second launcher icon ("DB+ (RAM)"). This release contains no copy of Date Book+; you need the .prc of version 3.0H yourself. Confirmed on a Visor (Palm OS 3.5.2H3) and, for the patch itself, on a Palm m515 and a Tungsten E2 in the emulator.
• tools/yearfinder finds the places in an application's code that draw the year, to extend the table.
• Fixed: Prepare Update now names the real offset ("28 years early"), not always 36. The default start year is 1932 (since beta.2).

Before you start: make a HotSync backup and insert an SD card if you can. Enabling converts your stored dates; dates before the start year (birthdays before 1932 with the default) are set to its first year. Emergency exit: a soft reset holding the navigator up button starts the Palm without DateFix. Please read the README.

Works on

• Tungsten T3 (Palm OS 5.2.1), Palm m515 (4.1) - tested on the devices
• Handspring Visor (3.5.2H3): the built-in Date Book is right; Date Book+ 3.0H right in every view with the RAM copy
• Tungsten E2 and Palm m515 in an emulator, including a reminder for 2032 that fires at the 2031/2032 rollover, an entry from 2025 read with the clock in 2033 and the World Clock in 2033

Everything else with Palm OS 5 or 3.5 – 4.x is expected to work but not confirmed - please report your device, Palm OS version and the Test line from DateFix (see the README).

Known limitations

• Only Date Book+ 3.0H is in the patch table. Other applications that draw the year themselves, and other versions, still show the internal year.
• Date Book+ keeps its records in its own database; DateFix does not convert them (format unknown). The hardware button and alarms start the ROM version of Date Book+, not the RAM copy.
• HotSync with a desktop transfers the internal dates.
• The window is 128 years; Palm OS below 3.5 is not supported.
• Not run on a device: time-dependent games.

Install: HotSync DateFix-2.0.0-beta.4.prc to the Palm, start DateFix, choose the start year, tap Enable, confirm the conversion. To update later use Options → Prepare Update (not Disable), then HotSync the new version.

SHA-256: e70382153685e3faf252e93d24267f6e9c4fbd6b5352e687685aa4e6abcaed02

DateFix 2.0.0-beta.2

Keep your Palm working after 31 December 2031. Second beta.

What's new in beta.2: the default start year is now 1932 (window 1932 – 2059). 28 years are 10,227 days, exactly 1,461 weeks, and the leap-year pattern repeats every 28 years, so weekdays and leap years are identical internally and in reality (beta.1's 1940 was 3 days off). Applications that do their own date arithmetic are then right without a patch; only a year they draw themselves still differs. Existing installs keep their start year (use Options → Prepare Update, then HotSync this version). New in the repository: tools/yearfinder, a scanner that finds the places in an application that draw the year themselves (for the planned per-application patch table).

Palm OS stops its calendar on 31 December 2031. DateFix moves the start of Palm OS's date counting from 1904 to a year you choose (default 1932), so the clock, the Calendar, Tasks, alarms and reminders keep working for another 128 years (1932 – 2059). The basic idea - run the clock in the past and add the offset when a year is shown - was published before by Tavisco (NaivePalmdayMitigation, Palm OS 3.5 - 4.x). DateFix automates and extends it: it moves the clock itself (surviving a reset), converts the stored dates once (with a backup to the SD card), patches more of the date API and also runs on Palm OS 5.

Before you start: make a HotSync backup and insert an SD card if you can. Enabling converts your stored dates; dates before the start year (birthdays before 1932 with the default) are set to its first year. Emergency exit: a soft reset holding the navigator up button starts the Palm without DateFix. Please read the README.

Works on

• Tungsten T3 (Palm OS 5.2.1), Palm m515 (4.1) - tested on the devices
• Tungsten E2 and Palm m515 in an emulator
• Handspring Visor (3.5.2H3): the built-in Date Book is right; Date Book+ shows the internal year in its week, two-week and year view (see known limitations)

Everything else with Palm OS 5 or 3.5 – 4.x is expected to work but not confirmed - please report your device, Palm OS version and the Test line from DateFix (see the README).

Known limitations

• Applications that draw the year themselves (not through the system's date functions), e.g. Date Book+ week/year view, show the internal year. A per-application patch table is planned.
• HotSync with a desktop transfers the internal dates.
• The window is 128 years; Palm OS below 3.5 is not supported.
• Not yet run on a device: a reminder set in 2031 for 2032, reading a 2025 event in 2033, World Clock, time-dependent games. The arithmetic behind them is covered by host tests and emulators.

Install: HotSync DateFix-2.0.0-beta.2.prc to the Palm, start DateFix, choose the start year, tap Enable, confirm the conversion. To update later use Options → Prepare Update (not Disable), then HotSync the new version.

SHA-256: 384b2df25764c0a1a97dfcd154f8caeabd947dcda1410ddc31b11bb5ba6d94ec

DateFix 2.0.0-beta.1

Keep your Palm working after 31 December 2031. First public beta.

Palm OS stops its calendar on 31 December 2031. DateFix moves the start of Palm OS's date counting from 1904 to a year you choose (default 1940), so the clock, the Calendar, Tasks, alarms and reminders keep working for another 128 years (1940 – 2067). The basic idea - run the clock in the past and add the offset when a year is shown - was published before by Tavisco (NaivePalmdayMitigation, Palm OS 3.5 - 4.x). DateFix automates and extends it: it moves the clock itself (surviving a reset), converts the stored dates once (with a backup to the SD card), patches more of the date API and also runs on Palm OS 5.

Before you start: make a HotSync backup and insert an SD card if you can. Enabling converts your stored dates; dates before the start year (birthdays before 1940 with the default) are set to its first year. Emergency exit: a soft reset holding the navigator up button starts the Palm without DateFix. Please read the README.

Works on

• Tungsten T3 (Palm OS 5.2.1), Palm m515 (4.1) - tested on the devices
• Tungsten E2 and Palm m515 in an emulator
• Handspring Visor (3.5.2H3): the built-in Date Book is right; Date Book+ shows the internal year in its week, two-week and year view (see known limitations)

Everything else with Palm OS 5 or 3.5 – 4.x is expected to work but not confirmed - please report your device, Palm OS version and the Test line from DateFix (see the README).

Known limitations

• Applications that draw the year themselves (not through the system's date functions), e.g. Date Book+ week/year view, show the internal year. A per-application patch table is planned.
• HotSync with a desktop transfers the internal dates.
• The window is 128 years; Palm OS below 3.5 is not supported.
• Not yet run on a device: a reminder set in 2031 for 2032, reading a 2025 event in 2033, World Clock, time-dependent games. The arithmetic behind them is covered by host tests and emulators.

Install: HotSync DateFix-2.0.0-beta.1.prc to the Palm, start DateFix, choose the start year, tap Enable, confirm the conversion. To update later use Options → Prepare Update (not Disable), then HotSync the new version.

SHA-256: 92f0e11df7a0c78b9a2f1d8584b0da62b68c07bec2465456b029a8cf9f15b7c7