Dashboard has been permanently pulled from macOS Catalina

AppleInsiderAppleInsider
Posted:
in macOS
Apple is scrubbing references to Dashboard from WebKit, the engine underlying Safari, hammering a final nail in the coffin for the feature ahead of this fall's macOS Catalina.

macOS Catalina with Dashboard missing


A changelog along those lines was posted earlier this week, Mac Otakara noted. While WebKit is open-source, the log's author is listed as Sam Weinig, an Apple software engineer.

The absence of Dashboard was recently noticed in probing Catalina beta code. The feature has been disabled by default since 2014's OS X Yosemite, but remains an option through macOS Mojave.

Apple first launched Dashboard with OS X Tiger in 2005. The technology brought first-party widgets to OS X, such as a calculator and a weather forecast -- arguably laying some of the groundwork for iPhone apps in 2007.

The concept is now redundant on macOS however, since the Notification Center offers widgets without having to switch to a fullscreen overlay.

macOS Catalina will include features like using an iPad as a second display, a unified "Find My" app, and the breakup of iTunes into three separate apps -- Music, Podcasts, and TV. Device sync will shift to Finder.
dualie

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 20
    The OwlThe Owl Posts: 2unconfirmed, member
    Please correct your article - the photo at the top of the page is of Launchpad, NOT Dashboard.
    cia
  • Reply 2 of 20
    Roger_FingasRoger_Fingas Posts: 148member, editor
    The Owl said:
    Please correct your article - the photo at the top of the page is of Launchpad, NOT Dashboard.
    Notice the highlighted segment of the image.
    jbdragonhodarStrangeDaysnapoleon_phoneapartfastasleepalanhflashfan207
  • Reply 3 of 20
    AppleishAppleish Posts: 691member
    I accidentally launched it a couple of weeks ago. I thought I had traveled back in time for a moment.
    hodar
  • Reply 4 of 20
    hobnoblehobnoble Posts: 10member
    The converter is awesome. I still use it occasionally for currency, metric and volume conversions. I wish they would update its widget.
    Tireamontrosemacs
  • Reply 5 of 20
    chasmchasm Posts: 3,291member
    hobnoble said:
    The converter is awesome. I still use it occasionally for currency, metric and volume conversions. I wish they would update its widget.
    Well, clearly they won’t. Still, you do have some options. Check with the developer or other parties to see if they have a notifications centre widget that does the same thing, or just ask Siri on the Mac (or iOS) to do any conversions for you (this is what I’ve been doing for ages, works really well).
  • Reply 6 of 20
    DAalsethDAalseth Posts: 2,783member
    I played with Dashboard a few times. Never really used it though.
    pulseimages
  • Reply 7 of 20
    WgkruegerWgkrueger Posts: 352member
    The Owl said:
    Please correct your article - the photo at the top of the page is of Launchpad, NOT Dashboard.
    Dashboard is not there anymore thus the lack of a Dashboard screenshot from a Catalina system. 
  • Reply 8 of 20
    StrangeDaysStrangeDays Posts: 12,875member
    Roger_Fingas said:
    The Owl said:
    Please correct your article - the photo at the top of the page is of Launchpad, NOT Dashboard.
    Notice the highlighted segment of the image.
    Agreed, but judging by the number of comments on the last article, I'd considering using a more eye-catching highlight -- a thicker stroke, an oblong circle, hand-drawn, etc.
  • Reply 9 of 20
    flydogflydog Posts: 1,123member
    Wgkrueger said:
    The Owl said:
    Please correct your article - the photo at the top of the page is of Launchpad, NOT Dashboard.
    Dashboard is not there anymore thus the lack of a Dashboard screenshot from a Catalina system. 
    Launchpad has zero relevance to the topic of this article. Obviously one can't post a picture of nothing, but a more relevant illustration would have been the current version of MacOS running dashboard, which is basically what every other website and new organization is doing.
    edited June 2019
  • Reply 10 of 20
    techsavytechsavy Posts: 34member
    Never really got used to dashboard. 
  • Reply 11 of 20
    lmaclmac Posts: 206member
    I always found the dashboard annoying. Why an entirely different interface with new rules? And if you're using one of the widgets, such as the calculator, you have to keep going back and forth between the two interfaces. Bad user-interface design.
  • Reply 12 of 20
    mr lizardmr lizard Posts: 354member
    The notification centre widgets are awful. On a Mac Mini with a Core i7, SSD, and 16GB RAM there’s still a delay while they load and move about. Trying to chase the calculator as it shuffles about whilst widgets above and below it load and spring into view make it useless for me. 
  • Reply 13 of 20
    steven n.steven n. Posts: 1,229member
    I really miss it in my day to day uses while I work on SwiftUI. From having quick access to multiple clocks, multiple weather, stocks at a glance...

    I used it many many times per day...
    dualie
  • Reply 14 of 20
    dualiedualie Posts: 334member
    I'm not impressed given that there are no replacements for almost ALL of the widgets I use in Dashboard. No dictionary, no unit converter, no translation widget, no Notes. This is pretty annoying, but typical of something Apple would pull.
    edited June 2019
  • Reply 15 of 20
    MichalPfeilMichalPfeil Posts: 8member
    Sad to see this go. Way more practical than Notification Center. No scrolling needed. One key tap and all my many widgets in front of me. So tired of Apple trying to make the Mac interface like iOS.
    scampercomapres587
  • Reply 16 of 20
    scampercomscampercom Posts: 89member
    Reading these comments, I know what killed Dashboard. I’m in the other camp: I use Dashboard many times every day. Thinking ahead, I have managed to replace my dashboard widgets with “Today” (ugh) alternatives, which usually aren’t as nice as the older ones. The Calendar widget is just about useless compared to the simple yet amazing “iCal Events” widget for example. And the Weather widget is a click chore to use vs. multiple at-a-glance click-free Weather widgets arranged nicely on the Dashboard. But yeah, I’ll get over it. It’s just irksome that a bunch of little utilities are about to get slightly worse.
    edited June 2019
  • Reply 17 of 20
    fastasleepfastasleep Posts: 6,417member
    hobnoble said:
    The converter is awesome. I still use it occasionally for currency, metric and volume conversions. I wish they would update its widget.
    You can do conversions in Spotlight. Type “1 gallon” or “$6.66”. Or use Siri. 
  • Reply 18 of 20
    eriamjheriamjh Posts: 1,642member
    I still the calculator for simple addition on pay day for bills and one-touch weather checks.   
    lmac said:
    I always found the dashboard annoying. Why an entirely different interface with new rules? And if you're using one of the widgets, such as the calculator, you have to keep going back and forth between the two interfaces. Bad user-interface design.
    It was possible to switch back to the overlay design.   That’s why I still used it.
    edited June 2019
  • Reply 19 of 20
    flashfan207flashfan207 Posts: 291member
    Roger_Fingas said:
    The Owl said:
    Please correct your article - the photo at the top of the page is of Launchpad, NOT Dashboard.
    Notice the highlighted segment of the image.
    Thank you! I can’t believe I didn’t notice that myself. I had a mini-heart attack there for a sec because I use Launchpad all the time. 
  • Reply 20 of 20
    fastasleepfastasleep Posts: 6,417member
    flashfan207 said:
    Roger_Fingas said:
    The Owl said:
    Please correct your article - the photo at the top of the page is of Launchpad, NOT Dashboard.
    Notice the highlighted segment of the image.
    Thank you! I can’t believe I didn’t notice that myself. I had a mini-heart attack there for a sec because I use Launchpad all the time. 
    Spotlight is faster. :)
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