Apple Dashboard Widgets Available

[daveL]

Am I the only person just a little disappointed with Tiger? I mean - there are some cool things in it but it didn't make my 1GHz Powerbook feel any faster. It didn't add any really cool functionality. Maybe there was some tinkering under the hood but I don't see it at all. This really does feel like it should have been a free upgrade - almost like they were REALLY trying to make it worth the money but just couldn't come up with enough new features.

I would say that you represent a minority view on the subject. There are several other Tiger threads where folks have given all the reasons they think Tiger's great, so I won't attempt to repeat them here. If Tiger isn't worth it to you, run Panther.

 

[Lacero]

Everybody has to upgrade to Tiger sooner or later. It's not like they have a choice. Heh. So why complain? It's like yelling to the wind.

 

[~Shard~]

Everybody has to upgrade to Tiger sooner or later. It's not like they have a choice. Heh. So why complain? It's like yelling to the wind.

No they don't. Maybe some people will simply wait for 10.5 Lion. 😛 😎

 

[quackattack]

No they don't. Maybe some people will simply wait for 10.5 Lion. 😛 😎

LOL..... When is Apple going to announce Lion?! Next Tuesday?!

Sorry, someone had to be that guy..... 😉

 

[swissmann]

swissman: if you put the number into google it will figure out which it is for you. i am sure that there is a google widget (if not apple then someone else) and that will do that for you and much more.

Thanks zellin! I did not know that Google would do that. I just tested UPS and FedEx tracking info and find it much easier than going to the shipper's home page, selecting which country I'm in, agreeing to their terms, entering in a number, and finally seeing the info. This is great! Now someone please make the widget if Apple does not.

 

[ryanw]

I would say that you represent a minority view on the subject. There are several other Tiger threads where folks have given all the reasons they think Tiger's great, so I won't attempt to repeat them here. If Tiger isn't worth it to you, run Panther.

I agree with the pervious poster. Tiger is not really all that different from Panther from the users perspective. Sure there's spotlight, which takes an increadible amount of "behind the scenes" to make happen. There's also dashboard, I think it's cool but nothing I didn't have before, just a different way to get it. There's a few other cool stuff, but overall from the initial perspective, it seems like a minor update.

Honestly, the biggest advancements in Tiger are two fold. The first being 64bit OS for G5 processor machines and second being the CORE VIDEO. At first this seems like a minor thing, but for developers creating mac specific apps, this could be huge. This could open up a whole world in MACOSX. Imagine the ability to theme the desktop like never before could have been done. It'll be intersting to see where these two major advancements take us.

Sure, they're kinda' "boring" at first, but being true 64bit is HUGE and having an amazing OpenGL environment is essential for todays apps.

 

[BWhaler]

As a coder I plan to start to make some widgets. I hope others will do the same. The few that I have tested look promising, but we need more 🙂

Thanks on behalf of all of us for doing this. Developers like you are what make the Mac so fantastic.

 

[Ibjr]

Widgets are mostly HTML/XML based with style sheets. Some widgets will actually work in a browser. There might be other ways to make widgets also. Apps should be self explanatory.

I thought all widgets worked in a browser. Wasn't one of the selling points that this made it easier to code? Has this changed?

 

[broken_keyboard]

The Apple Widget site has been taken back down.

 

[840quadra]

The Apple Widget site has been taken back down.

Yup, someone else noted that prior to your post,

I wonder if it was just a teaser for the rumor threads like these!. If I were apple I would leave it up for more incentive to buy Tiger for those on the fence. Granted I know Tiger release party will be packed as it is, it should be fun anyway.

 

[bumfilter]

I thought all widgets worked in a browser. Wasn't one of the selling points that this made it easier to code? Has this changed?

Most of them will work in a browser but I think the ones that have spinning preference pages etc, need to use different code that won't work fully.

 

[MillieWales]

Everybody has to upgrade to Tiger sooner or later. It's not like they have a choice. Heh. So why complain? It's like yelling to the wind.

No they don't. A friend of mine is a full time graphic designer and he is using OS 9 just happily - not in classic mode, he actually doesn't have OS 10 on his machines. He's happy.

 

[Tcnorman]

Am I the only person just a little disappointed with Tiger? Maybe there was some tinkering under the hood but I don't see it at all. This really does feel like it should have been a free upgrade - almost like they were REALLY trying to make it worth the money but just couldn't come up with enough new features.

I guess I would ask you what you would want to see in an upgrade such as Tiger. I feel like they put a lot of work into a lot of things that make everything run much smoother, but we just don't see it at face value. Convince me there is some feature that would make Tiger worth paying for.

 

[oeholmen]

As a coder I plan to start to make some widgets. I hope others will do the same. The few that I have tested look promising, but we need more 🙂

There will probably a lot of coders that will start developing widgets when Tiger arrives. It would be great to have a website where you can find all these widgets. So I registered widgetsweb.com to fill this gap! Hope to have the website up in a few days.

If there is anybody here that would like to contribute, that would be great. I could use help with anything from page design to ideas about how the site should be. And of cause I need developers that will post widgets to the site!

 

[esXXI]

Cool to see me and my mate's miniPatience, Snake and miniOandX widgets on Apple's site.. 😎

 

[nagromme]

Package tracking

swissman: if you put the number into google it will figure out which it is for you. i am sure that there is a google widget (if not apple then someone else) and that will do that for you and much more.

That's REALLY cool! It figures out what carrier, and tracks the package in one click 🙂

The Google bar in Safari does that AND acts as a calculator (Google does unit conversions and everything). Sometimes I think if I knew everything Google did I might never need any app besides Safari 🙂

 

[h00ligan]

That's REALLY cool! It figures out what carrier, and tracks the package in one click 🙂

The Google bar in Safari does that AND acts as a calculator (Google does unit conversions and everything). Sometimes I think if I knew everything Google did I might never need any app besides Safari 🙂

buy the google hacks book.. you'll cream yourself 🙂

 

[Rod Rod]

be back Friday!

The link is back up, and at the moment it looks like this:

 

[tonywalker23]

Sports widget

someone please make or tell me were to find a sports widget. i have the bottom line ticker from espn on my pc but would love a widget on my mac that did the same thing. something that would let me pick my fav teams and it would show my a scoreboard.

a Bible thing to type in a verse referance and it pulls up the verse from somewhere like biblegateway.com would be cool too.
dont know it is possible and i certainly dont have a clue how to do it. just an idea,

tony walker
www.preachertony.com

 

[d.perel]

I am kicking myself in the head because I didn't pre-order tiger! This stuff looks all so coooool! Luckily, i can just run to the apple store in 3 days

 

[MacSA]

It's a shame that the vast majority of widgets are only going to be of use to American Apple users.

 

[Random Avenger]

I don't think apple is going to release any more OS's before Longhorn unless they are sure that they are going to get it finished before Longhorn. If they have an OS looming, then they are setting themselves up for attack my MS saying "Look, they can't release an OS on time either!" (completely ignoring the fact that apple has released 2-3? operating sytems in the time it takes them to release one). I expect we will see something announced directly after Longhorn is released, unless there are unexpected delays.

 

[rockthecasbah]

next OS

I don't think apple is going to release any more OS's before Longhorn unless they are sure that they are going to get it finished before Longhorn. If they have an OS looming, then they are setting themselves up for attack my MS saying "Look, they can't release an OS on time either!" (completely ignoring the fact that apple has released 2-3? operating sytems in the time it takes them to release one). I expect we will see something announced directly after Longhorn is released, unless there are unexpected delays.

Definitely, Apple has been displaying how Tiger has come out before Longhorn and with "the same" technology Longhorn is supposed to display. If they released another OS, it would seem that they are trying to desperately compete with Longhorn...Though how buggy windows is, it probably will just be competing against itself 🙂 . I would be highly surprised if they decided to make another release before Longhorn.

 

[tny]

someone please make or tell me were to find a sports widget. i have the bottom line ticker from espn on my pc but would love a widget on my mac that did the same thing. something that would let me pick my fav teams and it would show my a scoreboard.

a Bible thing to type in a verse referance and it pulls up the verse from somewhere like biblegateway.com would be cool too.
dont know it is possible and i certainly dont have a clue how to do it. just an idea,

tony walker
www.preachertony.com

Creating a Bible lookup would be pretty easy, I think: basically just create a web page that has a simplified version of the form on the biblegateway page and repurpose it as a widget.

The sports ticker would just be an RSS reader that scrolls the results horziontally. You'd need an RSS source for sports scores.

 

[tny]

It's a shame that the vast majority of widgets are only going to be of use to American Apple users.

That's only going to be true if the vast majority of widgets are only created by American Apple users. Look at the Konfabulator page: they have plenty of stuff from outside the US: just to take the RSS feeds category (where this matters most) Canada, Britain, the Netherlands, Germany, Australia, Japan, Turkey . . .