Filed under: Widget Watch
A few of my favorite Widgets
When my machine was a rickety little 800 MHz iBook, crusted with too many hacks, apps and utilities, I just gave up on Widgets. Dashboard was a system hog on an already dog-slow machine, and I just killed it off. My MacBook Pro is another story. While I've eschewed the volume of Widgets a true power-user may install, I have my fair share. Of course, until we're able to safely and securely swap our sets of Widgets around, I just keep a certain set loaded. Yes, I've tried MultiDash, primarily to swap around when I plug in to my 24" external monitor. I would have included a link to the MultiDash page, but going there today either crashed Firefox or made Safari eat up processor. Gotta love that...Anyway, as a Widget, it was too wonky for production use, so here's what I've settled on for daily use:
- Apple's own calendar, weather, iTunes, calculator, and search Widgets (Dictionary, White Pages, Yellow Pages, and Address Book). The unit converter is tucked behind the sticky note
- Google search-- pretty much never use it since Google is built-in to every browser but Flock, although sometimes I use the Blogger one too
- Radar-in-Motion-- massive kudos to the poor developer who makes this, as NOAA keeps changing the protocols, formats, etc. I love this thing, but I love weather.
- WeatherBug-- this one has a bunch more features, but ironically doesn't work as well as R-i-M
- iClipLite-- what would I do without this? Very handy for storing form letters, the very ones I use every day
- iStat nano-- surely everyone is using this or its older sibling by now, right? Often I use it to check my IP address, but I really wish I could have it quit bugging me about updates, that is really annoying
- Slothcam-- I have it always tuned to the TGIFriday's camera in Times Square, great for people-watching! (You will see me on there once in a while too)
- Web Translator widget (uses Google)-- handy for quick language lookups, as my Spanish vocab stinks sometimes
- Airport Radar-- handy for checking signal strength
- PackageTracker-- from Monkey Labs, where they make a terrible TV Tracker... only terrible because every week they want me to update it, but it never gets faster or better, yet PackageTracker never bugs me about it
- iCalEvents-- super-fantastic for glancing at my hard schedule for the day
- Backpack widget-- from Chipt.com, this Widget has saved me so many times it is scary. If you are a serious GTD nut, you must have a Backpack widget for simple ticklers, and this does the job better than almost anything. Plus, I can access my Backpack reminders from anywhere via web, so I have a constant backup. Combined with floating reminders via Growl, and you can really tame your to-do list.
- an obligatory digg widget-- because I'm addicted, I'll admit (where's that Netscape widget?)
- Veronica Belmont-- she's not a Widget, but a spunky tech pundit for CNet
- and of course, I have a TUAW widget!
So what's in your Dashboard?
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
FRITZ the Cat said 6:07PM on 11-21-2006
you are more a kind of fun user - aren't you?
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Nik Fletcher said 6:17PM on 11-21-2006
Dashalytics for Google Anaytics in Dashboard:
http://dashalytics.rovingrob.com/
Radiotastic for Radio Stream Listening and Recording:
http://www.radiotastic.com
TrafficMeter to watch my network usage:
http://www.shockwidgets.com/?widget=TrafficMeter
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Old Man said 6:36PM on 11-21-2006
Only the Chia Pet for me baby:
http://novisdesign.net/Widgets?chipet
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Adrian vG said 3:02AM on 11-22-2006
Calculator
Unit Converter
2 Weather widgets
Whoopie Cusion
all anybody should need, and saves your RAM.
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Bill Eccles said 6:43PM on 11-21-2006
Radar-in-Motion: Absolutely excellent. Fun to see what's on the way, especially if it's dark green or very white.
Airport Radar: excellent network scanner from
IP Widget: I keep four instances running, one for each interface (built-in Ethernet, AirPort, FireWire and one for the WAN address). Beautifully simple, underpriced at free, and no nagging.
Package Tracker and some of the standard Apple stuff. I keep it light or firing up Dashboard takes too long (even with that program, what's it called, Dashboard Kickstart?).
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Bill Eccles said 6:46PM on 11-21-2006
Hmph. The URLs got eaten. Sorry 'bout that.
Here are the relevant URLs for not-already-mentioned stuff:
IP Widget
http://cip.physik.uni-bonn.de/~maahn/
Airport Radar:
http://www.macwireless.com/html/support/airport_radar/index.php
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Dustin said 6:47PM on 11-21-2006
I keep iClip Lite, Dictionary/Thesaurus, Calendar, Calculator, Screenshot Plus, OnTour, and Locker (for those times I have to walk away from my computer). All great widgets... oh, and TV Tracker isn't THAT terrible...
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Gandhi said 7:04PM on 11-21-2006
Fidelity stock (as pointed out by TUAW)
iStat Pro
Wikipedia
Distionary/Thesaurus
Yellow Pages
Unit Converter
Weatherbug
Calendar
I do have others installed - mostly freeware games, but dont have them active
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Jason said 7:12PM on 11-21-2006
Airport Radar
iStat Nano
Calculator
Weather
Locker
Radiotastic
Occasionally use SingthatiTune to tag lyrics and ontour for concert info.
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ryank said 8:15PM on 11-21-2006
Well, I'm stuck on a 867 Mhz Titanium Powerbook, and due to that I keep a pretty light dashboard, including:
Apple's calculator, calendar and weather.
The unit conversion - which comes in handy when my American-centric mind has to deal with Kilometers.
The OED dictionary - VERY helpful in linguistic classes, as well as the occasional Scrabble debate.
Sol - a sunrise/sunset widget. Very helpful in New England for cyclists, when riding time is often decided by daylight - especially this time of year.
And Jason - SingthatiTune was very helpful, but it started acting wonky on me. I also like Mac Man for occasional in class/bored use.
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JonathanC said 8:51PM on 11-21-2006
hey victor, glad you liked the veronica widget, :-). my bro and i made it, and will continue to tweak its development with improvements and such-and-such :-)
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Zach Everson said 9:00PM on 11-21-2006
I find Widgets to be a waste. It's easier to open up a browser than to look at Widgets, at the expense of all other aps, and wait for them to load.
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kenyatta said 5:18PM on 11-26-2006
Besides the basics (weather, Dictionary, Google Search)...couldn't live without iStat Nano, iPhoto Mini, and the Fidelity one (thanks TUAW!)...after the initial overload, went with a less is more approach and these six have stuck.
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Jason said 9:53PM on 11-21-2006
ryank - sorry to hear singthatitune was acting strange. There are a couple more, harmonic being one that I've tried. I think it automatically adds lyrics it downloads.
http://www.mindquirk.com/widgets/harmonic/index.htm
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shaninho said 10:22AM on 11-22-2006
I keep four clocks (CST, Istanbul, Cape Town for WC 2010!, Seoul), iStat Pro, rpncalc, calendar, and weatherbug.
anyone who says it's faster to find all this info at once in a browser, i'll race ya. Plus I think my Mac Pro is doing just fine with 'em running!
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Mark D. said 10:07PM on 11-21-2006
I'm also a big fan of RadarInMotion, and use it in conjunction with Apple's weather widget. I also use iStat Pro, Apple's calendar widget and:
Google's GMail widget: I love being able to quickly glance at all new emails without having to load a browser window, it also replaced my Firefox GMail add-on in OS X.
TV Tracker: Beats hitting up TVGuide for a quick show time, though sometimes it hiccups getting show info.
NotePad: A great MacHeist reward, I've been using it to replace my burgeoning stickies collection with a nicer unified solution. I also like the locking feature as a quick way to secure my notes.
Comix: Since I used to read the comics in the daily paper growing up and I now follow a few web comics this makes it easier and quicker than tracking them all on their various sites.
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Peter Payne said 11:58PM on 11-21-2006
Yen rate checker
http://widgets.kuma.nu/
Reminder 1.2
caseapps.com
and the BIG one everyone should know about
Dashboard Kickstart, which opens your dashboard for you when you startup, wake up etc., and thus saves you from having to wait 20 seconds while everything wakes up
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Charles Eicher said 12:53AM on 11-22-2006
My favorite is Easy Envelopes from Ambrosia Software. EE originated as a desk accessory in 1987, so that means like Mac System 5 or thereabouts. I remember using EE desk accessory to print envelopes on Laserwriters on Mac SE and Mac II machines. Ambrosia Software updated it and released it as a widget, and I am so glad they did, it's invaluable. The EE widget is a little nugget of Mac history.
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Veronica said 1:27AM on 11-22-2006
Wow! I can't believe my widget was written about on tuaw! I say "my widget," but Jon and Kevin made it. I just fill it up with babbles.
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wim nerinckx said 3:43AM on 11-22-2006
My favourite still is the cute einstein quote generator, however, it has been taken out of the Apple site (why?) and is even nowhere to be found anymore.
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