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Dashboard Widget Contest Winners

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Original poster
Apr 12, 2001
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Apple has posted the winners of a developer's contest for Dashboard Widgets for the upcoming Mac OS X 10.4 (Tiger).

The two winners include:

Send SMS which "combines the instantly available Tiger Dashboard with Short Message Service, or SMS. SMS is a text message service that enables short messages of generally no more than 140-160 characters in length to be sent and transmitted from a cellphone."

WikityWidget which is a personal notepad which "lets you easily jot down and organize notes with hypertext links so they're easy to find and instantly available via the Mac OS X Tiger Dashboard".
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2005/03/08/dashboard-widget-contest-winners/
Except that WikityWidget looks a bit more robust than stickies. Kind of sad that is all developers could come up with for a contest.
 
Lollypop said:
Cant wait for Tiger, these widgets sound very cool!!
Click to expand...

Between this and the "Downloads" page categories yesterday, and the pro pages from yesterday - I think Tiger is going to be announced within the next two weeks, tops. Are there any major events that Apple is going to attend soon?

[master.shake]
 
It looks like Apple is just working on getting the loose ends tied up. Tiger might be out sooner than WWDC, where Apple will be demoing right to the developers and helping them use the newer technology in their apps. I don't think there will be much demoing in the keynote of Tiger if it seems to be coming all together already. They have the site up and right demoing all the new stuff and how it works.

http://www.apple.com/macosx/tiger/
 
master.shake said:
Between this and the "Downloads" page categories yesterday, and the pro pages from yesterday - I think Tiger is going to be announced within the next two weeks, tops. Are there any major events that Apple is going to attend soon?

[master.shake]
Click to expand...

Nope, not happening.
 
mad jew said:
How do you do this? That'd be really cool. :cool:
Click to expand...

Just put the phone number (no punctuation) preceded by "+1" (for the US) into iChat as a "New Chat With User." For instance, send to "+18885551234". (Doesn't work directly from Address Book though, even in the AIM field, so you must paste the number into iChat each time.)
 
nagromme said:
Just put the phone number (no punctuation) preceded by "+1" (for the US) into iChat as a "New Chat With User." For instance, send to "+18885551234". (Doesn't work directly from Address Book though, even in the AIM field, so you must paste the number into iChat each time.)
Click to expand...

Thanks heaps, so how do we get charged? Who foots the bill?
 
mad jew said:
Thanks heaps, so how do we get charged? Who foots the bill?
Click to expand...

generally sending via the internet (either by websites like verizon's vtext.com or i'd guess through aim as well) is free for the sender (no way to charge you really) and then the normal fee for the recipient of the message... in my case i think it's 2 cents or something
 
UI consistency

I used to think having every widget look different was annoying, and a bad violation of UI consistency. (I still think some things in Tiger--like Mail's toolbar--are bad for visual consistency.) But I've come around on Dashboard.

There's a good REASON for all that visual variety and bright coloring! it lets you visually locate what you want faster. It's as though every widget IS its own icon. (The Widget Bar isn't for primary use--it's for customizing Dashboard. Dashboard ITSELF is the primary widget interface: the ones you use regularly are all "just there.")

So... you summon ALL your chosen widgets vie Exposé, instantly spot what you want, use it, and then dismiss Dashboard. Get in, get out! Fast!

That wouldn't work well without a lot of visual variety--in shapes and colors both.

I get it now.

And I think the Wiki idea is cool :) These winners are PRACTICAL tools, not showy toys. Good!
 
Apple now has a WWDC blurb on the front page. It's in 90 days. Tiger is going to be the big topic at WWDC, so releasing there seems like obvious. Since Tiger will likely be locked in soon, I think Apple will use the time cushion to get its distribution together and actually be able to say, at WWDC, that Tiger is ready and that there are 1 million shrink-wrap copies waiting for orders.

That was more or less the iLife '05 strategy for MWSF. I ordered mine a few days after MWSF, and it came in the mail almost immediately.
 
nagromme said:
I used to think having every widget look different was annoying, and a bad violation of UI consistency. (I still think some things in Tiger--like Mail's toolbar--are bad for visual consistency.) But I've come around on Dashboard.

There's a good REASON for all that visual variety and bright coloring! it lets you visually locate what you want faster. It's as though every widget IS its own icon. (The Widget Bar isn't for primary use--it's for customizing Dashboard. Dashboard ITSELF is the primary widget interface: the ones you use regularly are all "just there.")

So... you summon ALL your chosen widgets vie Exposé, instantly spot what you want, use it, and then dismiss Dashboard. Get in, get out! Fast!

That wouldn't work well without a lot of visual variety--in shapes and colors both.

I get it now.

And I think the Wiki idea is cool :) These winners are PRACTICAL tools, not showy toys. Good!
Click to expand...

Yeah, that's a good point I haven't thought of. I'm still from the school of thought that it looks incoherent though so why can't Apple give us the option of having the widgets be colourful or Aqua-style?

One of the main reasons I'm not impressed with Tiger is the GUI inconsistencies. I know this sounds shallow but meh! One of the best reasons to buy a mac is because of the stunning GUI.

Back on topic though, this is a pretty disappointing display from Apple developers all things considered. Maybe they're not contributing on purpose because of how Apple handled the whole Konfabulator thing...
 
If you read the article, you'd see that these are more than just simple webpages. The SMS Widget uses backend code and an Address Book plug-in to send the SMS. This is if you have your Bluetooth phoned paired with the Address Book. (You can currently send SMS messages from Address Book by clicking on the phone number, then selecting "SMS Message", which is only available when your phone is paired.) This is just a Widget interface for existing functionality.

As far as the Wiki Widget: It uses the SQLite database that is coming in Tiger to store all of its information. This way you have persistent Wiki-ified (is that even a word) notes that can link to each other or the internet. Also, it uses a Mac OS X supplied search field (available only to Widgets) to leverage fast searching through all of your Wiki notes.

It was because these entries showed a unique take on interapplication communication that they were chosen. I think it shows great innovation, especially the Wiki entry, using SQL to store its information. Also, check out the linked article on Widget development: there is much more information in there as well.
 
nagromme said:
Just put the phone number (no punctuation) preceded by "+1" (for the US) into iChat as a "New Chat With User." For instance, send to "+18885551234". (Doesn't work directly from Address Book though, even in the AIM field, so you must paste the number into iChat each time.)
Click to expand...

Yeah - when I stick it in the address book, it makes that user permanently offline. But, when I start a new chat with just the +1number, then I can add that person to my buddy list and she has stayed online all mornin.
 
nagromme said:
Just put the phone number (no punctuation) preceded by "+1" (for the US) into iChat as a "New Chat With User." For instance, send to "+18885551234". (Doesn't work directly from Address Book though, even in the AIM field, so you must paste the number into iChat each time.)
Click to expand...
This is awesome - I had no idea!

I was able to set up a new buddy with my cell phone number as the AIM account, and I can simply select that buddy and do "Send Instant Message..." So I would guess you could do the same with any cell phone account you wanted.

What's even cooler is that you can reply easily from the phone. The number is just a 6-digit number in my reply to field, which was weird, but it works fine.
 
virividox said:
coudlnt u also send sms via adress book
Click to expand...
If you're in Address book and looking at an "SMS-able" entry, then you can launch the iChat messaging window directly from Address Book.

I don't see where you can SMS right from AB.
 
Diatribe said:
Yes you can. The guy who won the contest also wrote an sms plug-in for Address Book.
Click to expand...

That plugin appears to want to use a bluetooth phone for SMS, not AIM/iChat.

I bought a LG PM-325 just cuz it had bluetooth in it, but alas, all it appears to be good for is headsets. I can pair it, but I can't use it for anything at all. :( I wanted to send/receive SMS w/ the computer, since i hate T9 word.
 
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