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I can't imagine there'd be that many reasons to actually turn it off... Eh, whatever. I barely use it, but it can be handy.

My widgets:
-countdown till new year
-clock
-calendar
-weather
-mighty monitor (shows the battery life of your mouse or keyboard)
-iStat nano
-translater
-unit converter
-sticky note
-package tracker
 
I think it is a terrific functionality.

It is a quick way to check the calendar, istat(temp/resources), stickies, world time and weather without stopping what I am doing in other apps.

Certainly Apple should make it easy to turn off if people don't want it, but I use it several times per day.

R
 
I use mine for istatpro, yahoo weather, calendar and currency convertor.

Been thinking of the idea of turning it off, just to increase battery but never got round to it
 
I've only ever disabled it on my iBook G4 running Tiger. I even consider reenabling it - it's Spotlight that actually felt sluggish on there. (Yes, believe it or not, I still use that one as well!)

Anyway, I actually use Dashboard fairly extensively - translation, calculator, weather, conversion, iStat (nano), and the ESPN widget showing NHL scores.

From time to time I put a sticky note there, as well - usually if it's something small I need to remember. Feels more convenient than using TextEdit for this purpose, and I don't find it too awkward to access with no dedicated key - Fn+F12 I'm used to from my G4, and a touchpad swipe to the right brings it up just as quick.
 
To turn Dashboard off:

defaults write com.apple.dashboard mcx-disabled -boolean YES

To turn Dashboard on:

defaults write com.apple.dashboard mcx-disabled -boolean NO

You have to restart the Dock after making either change for it to take effect:

killall Dock

Will this work on Lion?
 
I really enjoy using dashboard for what it is: a home base for quick mini apps that provide you info quickly. I have two weather apps, sticky notes, hide/show hidden files, ip address info, and my favorite: package delivery tracking (delivery status widget). I do hope dashboard gets reworked to be even more useful. Very few people seem to be developing new widgets, but it still has potential.
 
I used it for iStat, weather, and calendar until I discovered GeekTool. It never made any sense to me that information I wanted to see constantly was hidden, and I had to keep popping this thing up on top of whatever I was doing to see it. I can see how some people like it better tucked away, and I don't know why Apple would get rid of Dashboard entirely. It just never suited me, though.

Incidentally, I have a lot of friends who use OSX, very casual, "go online, get email, facebook, netflix..." users. They didn't even know what the Dashboard was until I brought it up. I noticed one of them had the icon on his Dock, and asked if he accessed Dashboard using it. "What's a dashboard?" "That little speedometer looking icon." "Oh, I don't know what that is. I just left it there because it was there when I bought the computer." So he clicks it, and everyone in the room goes, "I don't get it."
 
I use the album art widgets and iStat regularly. I have noticed that there isn't many newly released widgets anymore. Are developers losing interest in Mac based apps to iOS? :(
 
Fast access to calculator, weather & translator
Honestly, I wish Apple made Dashboard work on the desktop instead of an overlay or a separate Space.
 
I use it almost daily for Sticky Notes. I also have the calendar and weather, but I could live without those.

But Sticky Notes is awesome for me.

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Fast access to calculator, weather & translator
Honestly, I wish Apple made Dashboard work on the desktop instead of an overlay or a separate Space.

No! This would be unnecessary clutter, like in Windows Vista / 7. The fact I love sticky notes in the dashboard is because they stay hidden but at easy instant reach.
 
iStat Pro, lyrics, calendar, weather, unit conversion tools, stickies notes, application update status, language conversion tool.
 
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