new widgets coming with leopard..

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Posted:
in macOS edited January 2014
Apple is pushing devs to enhance widgets with Quartz Composer.

Seems that leopard will feature new heavy widgets.

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 16
    irelandireland Posts: 17,802member
    I'm assuming by heavy you mean Widgets that use more system memory, right?
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  • Reply 2 of 16
    dacloodacloo Posts: 890member
    First thing I'll do with Leopard is to disable the Dashboard nonsense alltogether.
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  • Reply 3 of 16
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by dacloo View Post


    First thing I'll do with Leopard is to disable the Dashboard nonsense alltogether.



    you don't find it useful? i sure as hell do!
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  • Reply 4 of 16
    slewisslewis Posts: 2,081member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by jonnyboy View Post


    you don't find it useful? i sure as hell do!



    So should I get 2 GB of RAM or 3?



    Sebastian
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  • Reply 5 of 16
    I never understood why widgets are handy :-)

    Why clutter my system with widgets I don't look at the most of my time? Resources, memory...



    - a clock widget...it's in the right top of the screen.

    - an agenda widget...iCal anyone?

    - iTunes widget...why not open iTunes?

    - weather widget...my Google startpage does that better.

    - A calculator...there's already an calculator app I can use. I simply put it in the dock.

    It's even more convienent since I can use the calculator together with regular apps (e.g a spreadsheet).

    - and so forth...



    ... why duplicate existing apps into widgets? Why?



    It's just something that looks pretty and sold Tiger...but it's far from useful IMHO (but then again, I'm not a typical user).
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  • Reply 6 of 16
    irelandireland Posts: 17,802member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by jonnyboy View Post


    you don't find it useful? i sure as hell do!



    So do I, I don't get when people say that.
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  • Reply 7 of 16
    irelandireland Posts: 17,802member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by dacloo View Post


    I never understood why widgets are handy :-)

    Why clutter my system with widgets I don't look at the most of my time? Resources, memory...



    - a clock widget...it's in the right top of the screen.

    - an agenda widget...iCal anyone?

    - iTunes widget...why not open iTunes?

    - weather widget...my Google startpage does that better.

    - A calculator...there's already an calculator app I can use. I simply put it in the dock.

    It's even more convienent since I can use the calculator together with regular apps (e.g a spreadsheet).

    - and so forth...



    ... why duplicate existing apps into widgets? Why?



    It's just something that looks pretty and sold Tiger...but it's far from useful IMHO (but then again, I'm not a typical user).



    I could actually live without Dashboard, but I'm not sure how I would. Dashboard is a Godsend and 2Gigs of RAM is fine with it. 10 widgets or less that's my rule. The wikipedia widget relues, the upcoming brithday widget rules, the Mail app widget rules, the calander widget rules, and the converter app is absolutely indispensable.
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  • Reply 8 of 16
    slewisslewis Posts: 2,081member
    I have 13 Widgets

    1) iStat Pro

    2) RoughlyDrafted Widget

    3) Think Secret Widget (the 2 RSS Widgets I make an exception for)

    4) Dictionary.wdgt (more convenient then pulling up the App)

    5) WikiSuche (a Dutch Wikipedia Search Widget, it's the only one I can find that will actually load in my browser)

    6) Pong Clock

    7) Events at the Apple Store

    8) Stock Widget

    9) Tech Terms Search

    10) Astrology.com Widget

    11) Weather Widget

    12) PL8TZ (Displays a License Plate, mine being California, MAC4ME)

    13) Garnish (Displays a Classic Mac OS Icon or an Apple Logo)



    Fortunately the only resource spike is when I open up Dashboard for the first time after start up, but it really eats through RAM.



    Sebastian
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  • Reply 9 of 16
    tkntkn Posts: 224member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Ireland View Post


    I could actually live without Dashboard, but I'm not sure how I would. Dashboard is a Godsend and 2Gigs of RAM is fine with it. 10 widgets or less that's my rule. The wikipedia widget relues, the upcoming brithday widget rules, the Mail app widget rules, the calander widget rules, and the converter app is absolutely indispensable.



    Hmmm... I think that at least all the web widgets aren't very useful. Better to use keywords through Sogudi or the built-in function in Firefox.



    Upcoming birthday is kind of useful, I agree.



    I do keep an RPN calculator on there and a world clock widget, although with the new Adium timezone plugin, the world clock is a lot less necessary....



    The weather is pretty, especially since I never use a start page on my browser.
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  • Reply 10 of 16
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by dacloo View Post


    I never understood why widgets are handy :-)

    Why clutter my system with widgets I don't look at the most of my time? Resources, memory...



    - a clock widget...it's in the right top of the screen.

    - an agenda widget...iCal anyone?

    - iTunes widget...why not open iTunes?

    - weather widget...my Google startpage does that better.

    - A calculator...there's already an calculator app I can use. I simply put it in the dock.

    It's even more convienent since I can use the calculator together with regular apps (e.g a spreadsheet).

    - and so forth...



    ... why duplicate existing apps into widgets? Why?



    It's just something that looks pretty and sold Tiger...but it's far from useful IMHO (but then again, I'm not a typical user).



    I never understood why widgets aren't handy :-)



    Why clutter my system with various programs when I can use super-lightweight, easy-to-access widgets?



    - a clock at the top of the screen.... why not just take it out and use the widget? Now I can actually use all of the menus in Maya without that heinous space-bar shortcut.

    - iCal... when I just need to see what the date next Tuesday is, why wait for it to load up?

    - iTunes... why keep the window cluttering up my background when I can just pop into the dashboard when I need to skip a song?

    - weather widget... why anyone doesn't keep their start page blank is beyond me, especially when it's so easy (and sexy) to have it right in the dashboard

    - Calculator... why would anyone bother launching that app when the Dashboard widget is both more accurate and formats 1,000's places so much better?

    - and so forth...



    ... why use apps when widgets handle it all, more easily, with a 10th of the memory and system resources?
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  • Reply 11 of 16
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Slewis View Post


    I have 13 Widgets

    1) iStat Pro

    2) RoughlyDrafted Widget

    3) Think Secret Widget (the 2 RSS Widgets I make an exception for)

    4) Dictionary.wdgt (more convenient then pulling up the App)

    5) WikiSuche (a Dutch Wikipedia Search Widget, it's the only one I can find that will actually load in my browser)

    6) Pong Clock

    7) Events at the Apple Store

    8) Stock Widget

    9) Tech Terms Search

    10) Astrology.com Widget

    11) Weather Widget

    12) PL8TZ (Displays a License Plate, mine being California, MAC4ME)

    13) Garnish (Displays a Classic Mac OS Icon or an Apple Logo)



    Fortunately the only resource spike is when I open up Dashboard for the first time after start up, but it really eats through RAM.



    Sebastian



    That's only because you use so many lame widgets License plates? Mac OS X logo? C'mon.



    If you kept it down to useful widgets, you'd be in much better shape. My widgets combined right now use around 30MB.
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  • Reply 12 of 16
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by gregmightdothat View Post


    I never understood why widgets aren't handy :-)



    Why clutter my system with various programs when I can use super-lightweight, easy-to-access widgets?



    - a clock at the top of the screen.... why not just take it out and use the widget? Now I can actually use all of the menus in Maya without that heinous space-bar shortcut.

    - iCal... when I just need to see what the date next Tuesday is, why wait for it to load up?

    - iTunes... why keep the window cluttering up my background when I can just pop into the dashboard when I need to skip a song?

    - weather widget... why anyone doesn't keep their start page blank is beyond me, especially when it's so easy (and sexy) to have it right in the dashboard

    - Calculator... why would anyone bother launching that app when the Dashboard widget is both more accurate and formats 1,000's places so much better?

    - and so forth...



    ... why use apps when widgets handle it all, more easily, with a 10th of the memory and system resources?



    Widgets are more analogous to standalone App Services, not to be confused with the App Services that made NeXTSTEP and now OS X Cocoa apps so enjoyable. The problem is that the app developers haven't written these standalone widgets to leverage their appbase code: something I think Dashcode will rectify.



    If I own Create.app or say, OmniOutliner.app and they produce Widgets that allow me to do some interesting GUI based Services without having to launch the full-fledged App then that is a benefit to the owner of both applications.



    For instance, if I could load a built Flow Chart that I made within OmniOutliner.app and then within the widget could customize it with some Javascript/Ajax and then publish it to a blog via using Services of another app that exposed this service and made it available to the Widget, I could do some interesting stuff without having 3 apps opened up.



    However, if I'm working on large documents that need to be published a Widget won't do.



    Just a few thoughts.
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  • Reply 13 of 16
    slewisslewis Posts: 2,081member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by gregmightdothat View Post


    That's only because you use so many lame widgets License plates? Mac OS X logo? C'mon.



    If you kept it down to useful widgets, you'd be in much better shape. My widgets combined right now use around 30MB.



    Hey they look nice.

    http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...Picture3-1.png



    Please ignore the Google Gadget in the lower right hand corner. I've been testing Amnesty Generator and as you can see, it doesn't work as well as I hoped.



    Sebastian
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  • Reply 14 of 16
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by mdriftmeyer View Post


    Widgets are more analogous to standalone App Services, not to be confused with the App Services that made NeXTSTEP and now OS X Cocoa apps so enjoyable. The problem is that the app developers haven't written these standalone widgets to leverage their appbase code: something I think Dashcode will rectify.



    If I own Create.app or say, OmniOutliner.app and they produce Widgets that allow me to do some interesting GUI based Services without having to launch the full-fledged App then that is a benefit to the owner of both applications.



    For instance, if I could load a built Flow Chart that I made within OmniOutliner.app and then within the widget could customize it with some Javascript/Ajax and then publish it to a blog via using Services of another app that exposed this service and made it available to the Widget, I could do some interesting stuff without having 3 apps opened up.



    However, if I'm working on large documents that need to be published a Widget won't do.



    Just a few thoughts.



    Heheh... I was just responding to dacloo. He claimed that widgets were stupid because he personally doesn't use them. I was just throwing in a few counterpoints
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  • Reply 15 of 16
    mdriftmeyermdriftmeyer Posts: 7,503member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by gregmightdothat View Post


    Heheh... I was just responding to dacloo. He claimed that widgets were stupid because he personally doesn't use them. I was just throwing in a few counterpoints



    I know. I was just expounding on what I'd expect to be done using Dashcode.
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  • Reply 16 of 16
    tkntkn Posts: 224member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by gregmightdothat View Post


    I never understood why widgets aren't handy :-)



    Why clutter my system with various programs when I can use super-lightweight, easy-to-access widgets?



    - a clock at the top of the screen.... why not just take it out and use the widget? Now I can actually use all of the menus in Maya without that heinous space-bar shortcut.

    - iCal... when I just need to see what the date next Tuesday is, why wait for it to load up?

    - iTunes... why keep the window cluttering up my background when I can just pop into the dashboard when I need to skip a song?

    - weather widget... why anyone doesn't keep their start page blank is beyond me, especially when it's so easy (and sexy) to have it right in the dashboard

    - Calculator... why would anyone bother launching that app when the Dashboard widget is both more accurate and formats 1,000's places so much better?

    - and so forth...



    ... why use apps when widgets handle it all, more easily, with a 10th of the memory and system resources?



    I think Sizzling Keys is better than the iTunes widget. Key commands are always better, and you get feedback with Growl anyway...



    The clock in the corner is pretty essential if you are billing your time right? If you work for fixed budgets, then obviously less so, but time is just one of those things i just want instantly accessible (although I am somewhat partial to FuzzyClock)
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