are widgits worth it?

[sneckner]

swithching to Tiger? thanks.

[Mord]

it's not just widgets get tiger

[Lacero]

not by itself, no

[sourcemonkey]

if you mean 'is it worth switching to tiger for widgets alone?': no

if you mean 'are widgets a nice addition to computing with macs?': yes

if you mean... i give up. :confused:

[sneckner]

I appreciate the comments. What I mean is... widgets don't seem to do anything extremely unusual. Perhaps they save time, but don't they also suck system resources?

Another thing I mean is that if I want to use the calculator, I just click on its icon. If I want to know the weather, I have link to wundergound on Safari's bookmark bar.

So Spotlight seems worth it, but I'm wondering if I would even use the widgets, or if they are just more of a gimmick? Now I do use the dictionary a lot and translation. Do these widgets run fast or are they slow like Sherlock?

[Savage Henry]

Do these widgets run fast or are they slow like Sherlock? Faster than Sherlock by a long way, and arguably more useful ... if you pick the right ones.

[noel4r]

If you're only interested in widgets, then I dont think it's enough to upgrade but there are a lot of features like Spotlight and Automator that makes it worthwhile for a lot of users to move up to Tiger. The automator looks interesting to me. I hope it's powerful as they say it is. I'll mess w/ Tiger this weekend and will soon find out. BTW, whatever did happen w/ Sherlock? I thought it was a promising app but it looks like they've stopped working on it. Is it still included in Tiger?

[Mord]

10.4 is not just widgets and spotlight, the whole OS is allot faster, quartz is a heck of allot fast, in 10.3 when i typed it would lag no it's as smooth as silk (600MHz g3 ibook), the only downside is that more ram is used, 512 is the minimum at least get 768MB.

[James Philp]

The way the widgets work, IMO, is much better than konfabulator.
They are faster now in 10.4.1
It's worth if for the widgets + every other thing you get in tiger.

[Passante]

I like the dictionary widgit. Faster than opening a page in Safari.

[Applespider]

Perhaps they save time, but don't they also suck system resources?

Another thing I mean is that if I want to use the calculator, I just click on its icon. If I want to know the weather, I have link to wundergound on Safari's bookmark bar.

Depends how much RAM you have on your machine. A well-designed widget should only take up CPU processes and memory when Dashboard is activated by f12. Having 5 or 6 widgets open will use up nearly 100MB of real RAM so if you only have 256MB, you'll notice.

I didn't think I'd use Dashboard all that much - like you said, I have weather, travel reports, puzzles, comics all bookmarked. But, it is much faster to have them at the click of one button than even having them in a single bookmark folder and opening all tabs. Having said that, it wouldn't be the only reason for upgrading!

[redeye be]

A well-designed widget should only take up CPU processes and memory when Dashboard is activated by f12.
You're right about the CPU time. If it is designed with this in mind it's due to OS X that the widget doesn't activly use RAM. I think.

[sourcemonkey]

I appreciate the comments. What I mean is... widgets don't seem to do anything extremely unusual. Perhaps they save time, but don't they also suck system resources?

Another thing I mean is that if I want to use the calculator, I just click on its icon. If I want to know the weather, I have link to wundergound on Safari's bookmark bar.

So Spotlight seems worth it, but I'm wondering if I would even use the widgets, or if they are just more of a gimmick? Now I do use the dictionary a lot and translation. Do these widgets run fast or are they slow like Sherlock?

James P summed it up really, tiger doesn't just add widgets to your OS.

However, since we're talking widgets here. i have to say that i've really found them useful. i've set dashboard up to be activated by the bottom left 'hot corner' of my screen so access is pretty much immediate (much easier to activate than going to a bookmark, for example).

Furthermore, i've found myself using the notepad a great deal, just to jot down reminders that i can access any time just by mousing to the hot corner. The dictionary is fantastic; the weather widget of dubious value; but the currency converter and calculator are invaluable (especially as you can do your calculations and note the results in the notepad with no fuss.

anyway, i didn't mean to offend, but you would have got a better response if you first message was as good as your second. the first was a bit 'lacking' - not so the second.

Oh yes, and i've noticed no slow down on my ibook G4 with 768meg sdram.

[BornAgainMac]

There is a ton more widgets to download. Not just the widgets that ship with Tiger like weather and calculator.