Enwidget: Ten useful Apple Dashboard widgets

Niall Kennedy contributes Enwidget, where he explores the ins and outs of the rapidly expanding universe of glanceable information applications and devices.

Apple Dashboard widgets can be a quick way to reference your favorite data in a small heads-up-display. Just a few weeks ago we discussed some of the basic features of Tiger and Leopard widgets for Mac. Today I'll walk through some of my favorite widgets for productivity and fun.

BART transit widget
Plan your next trip on Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) with this Apple Design Award winning widget from Bret Victor. You can view multiple map renderings of the subway system, discover upcoming train arrivals, and plan the fastest route to your destination. All data is stored locally for quick offline access.

Package Tracker
Where's my gadget? This handy package tracker from Monkey Business Labs helps me track packages on their way to my door. Just enter a tracking number and the widget will automatically update with the latest time, date, and location of your iPhone accessories or other goodies.

[Niall likes his Package Tracker, but give me Delivery Status by Mike Piontek any day. -Ed.]

Widsense
Widsesnse tracks your websites' Google AdSense revenue and click-through rates. Watch the money roll in before your next big gadget purchase.

Google Analytics widget
Dashalytics keeps my website statistics just a keystroke away. The widget displays your website traffic tracked by Google Analytics over the last day, week, or year. Keep track of traffic spikes, trends, and raw data without the full Gooogle Analytics interface.

HTML Entity lookup
Find the correct character codes for your web projects with a HTML Entity widget by Left Logic. Search for characters based on how they look -- c for copyright, asterisk for bullets, etc. -- and quickly copy the results to the clipboard.

PHP Function Reference
Keep your programming manual close at hand with the PHP Function Reference. PHPfr lets you search for full documentation for any function, test date formatting, and view full documentation using the same information found on PHP.net.

MLB Schedule
My office is two blocks from AT&T Park, home of the San Francisco Giants. I keep on top of home game schedules and recent scores with the MLB Schedule widget from Logan Rockmore Design. The widget also tracks games in progress, providing the latest scores and statistics as it happens. Bonus: a glance at my Dashboard also lets me know when 40,000 baseball fans might descend on my corner of the city.

iStat Pro
Keep track of your Mac's vital statistics with iStat Pro by iSlayer. You can track up to 8 CPU cores at once, monitor memory utilization, check on your battery status (even how many charge cycles its had), view individual component temperatures, and much more. iStat Pro provides a pretty cool glimpse inside your Mac hardware.

AirPort Radar
Fire up AirPort Radar from MacWireless to scan for local WiFi access points. This widget displays signal strength, security status, access point channels, and more. AirPort Radar is a quick way to scan for open networks while you're on the go. (See also: WiFind.)

Stop Dashboard
Dashboard widgets are fun, but too many open widgets will swallow valuable memory and CPU time. This simple widget kills your Dock application and restarts Dashboard. Your widgets are not reloaded until the next time you launch the heads-up-display, freeing up system resources and extending your battery life.

So, which widgets are you into? Leave 'em in comments!

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Niall Kennedy is a well-known widget researcher. He organized the first-ever widget conference in November 2006 and the first research reports on the web widget space in February 2007. His current project Startup Search tracks the emerging web technology ecosystem.

[Donald @ Jul 7th 2007 3:50PM]

Obligatory "Engadget widget" mention

[scott @ Jul 7th 2007 3:57PM]

ahh, Dublin, CA...home sweet home!

[John @ Jul 7th 2007 4:03PM]

Great article, Niall. Thanks!

[michael @ Jul 7th 2007 4:09PM]

The only one I don't like is the BART transit widget. Considering that I don't live in San Francisco, it's kind of useless to me. So it shouldn't be on the top 10. I'm also more of a FedEx person than a UPS person. Maybe they have a FedEx version.

Will Engadget post the top 10 Vista Sidebar Gadgets soon? There are quite a good number of them that are as good as these widgets.

[Ryan Block @ Jul 7th 2007 5:10PM]

Yep!

[Thad Moore @ Jul 8th 2007 12:10AM]

Package Tracker can track UPS, FedEx, and DHL.

[Leonard Nimrod @ Jul 8th 2007 12:50AM]

I've heard of a "FedEX person"

Does that make you a FedEX fanboy? :-D

[Chris Masto @ Jul 13th 2007 6:22AM]

Hi, Engadgeteers! I just wanted to let you know that we've got a major update to Package Tracker in the works. If you want to get in on the beta testing, you can snag a copy at http://www.independentchicken.com/pt3/

[Steve @ Jul 7th 2007 4:13PM]

Extra credit if you can find me all the Konfabulator (I refuse to "upgrade" to Yahoo Widgets) alternatives.

[eric @ Jul 7th 2007 4:15PM]

what about the matrix rain????

[Ireland @ Jul 7th 2007 4:18PM]

Here's my list of 10:
1. Google widget (bundled)
2. Google Images
3. Upcoming Birthdays http://www.apple.com/downloads/dashboard/email_messaging/upcomingbirthdays.html
4. Apple Mail counter (announced vocally if you want it to) http://www.apple.com/downloads/dashboard/email_messaging/mailwidget.html
5. Unit Converter (coverts anything really) (bundled)
6. BBC Weather (for those of us in Europe) http://www.apple.com/downloads/dashboard/information/bbcweather.html
7. Stopwatch widget 1.3
8. Date and calendar (bundled)
9. Wikipedia
10. Stocks (bundled)

[wizard13335 @ Jul 7th 2007 4:24PM]

An site-stats widget for Mint (www.haveamint.com) users: Junior Mint http://haveamint.com/peppermill/junior_mint/

[nicleT @ Jul 7th 2007 4:31PM]

Hi,

iStat Pro is an essential one!

I used Package Tracker for a time but now I use Delivery Status which is more flexible.
http://mikepiontek.com/software/mac/delivery-status.html

Stop Dashboard is great but I personally use DashQuit which also tells the % of memory used by the displayed widgets. Very handy, take a look:
http://elaum.free.fr/Softwares/

But the most essential Widget for me is still the Translator ;)

Au revoir !

[Galley @ Jul 7th 2007 4:45PM]

iCal Events

[paloooz @ Jul 7th 2007 4:49PM]

What did you use to scale the screenshots? MSPAINT.EXE??

[Miles @ Jul 7th 2007 4:52PM]

And for Vista gadgets..

Oh wait, Vista ripped us off.


I loled at the Engadget widget though.

[ogvor @ Jul 7th 2007 4:57PM]

I find the Radar in Motion from the weather channel to be useful.

I also use the wikipedia and iStat Nano, but those have already been mentioned.

[Geoffrey King @ Jul 7th 2007 5:00PM]

The BART transit widget seems useless. The basic function appears to be scheduling and planning your trip. If you go to www.511.org it will account for BART, MUNI, SamTrans, AC Transit, etc. Or even BART's site can give you the basic scheduling you need. This useless software just adds some fancy colors. Whoopedeedo!

[mediaphile @ Jul 14th 2007 6:58AM]

Those require an internet connection, and they don't announce reminders for upcoming train departures. Besides, this is a little quicker and easier if you already know what station you want to go to.

[S. Brown @ Jul 7th 2007 5:03PM]

I didn't think many of those widgets Engadget have listed are actually useful (to me at least), apart from the AirPort Radar. I don't own an iPhone anywhoo so its irrelevant.

[paloooz @ Jul 7th 2007 5:51PM]

iPhone? This article has nothing to do with the iPhone. Those widgets are for the Mac OS X Dashboard, not for the iPhone.

[S. Brown @ Jul 7th 2007 6:15PM]

I meant that. There's been so many iPhone articles here its scrambled my Brains!

[Ferny @ Jul 7th 2007 5:22PM]

while were at it can engadget have a top 10 firefox extensions?

[Benjamin Hunt @ Jul 7th 2007 6:18PM]

Delivery Status is wwaaayyyy better than package tracker:

http://www.apple.com/downloads/dashboard/shopping/deliverystatus.html

[Geoffrey Sperl @ Jul 7th 2007 7:21PM]

I see Dashboard as being a very simple tool to just look at info quickly. I don't want to read RSS feeds to search Google when that's already in my browser. So, the widgets that I am always running are:

1. Calculator
2. Address Book
3. Dictionary
4. Unit Converter
5. The Weather Channel
6. IP Widget
7. OptionAlt (launches the Keyboard Viewer to help you find special characters)

IP Widget and OptionAlt are free from
http://cip.physik.uni-bonn.de/~maahn/index.html

I will run Flight Tracker if there is a flight I need to pay attention to, but that is the extent of my time-to-time widgets.

[Geoffrey Sperl @ Jul 7th 2007 7:23PM]

"I don't want to read RSS feeds to search Google..." that should be "I don't want to read RSS feeds or to search Google..."

[ABrad45 @ Jul 7th 2007 8:52PM]

pearLyrics anyone?

[thomas @ Jul 8th 2007 12:28AM]

Vista gadgets were demonstrated at PDC before Tiger and Dashboard were first shown. But I'm sure you all knew that.

[Will @ Jul 11th 2007 10:27AM]

Sure they were..

[Jose @ Jul 8th 2007 12:46AM]

A couple more...

Deep Sleep - lets me put my Macbook into standby instead of sleep for times when I need maximum battery power.

App Update - checks all my apps against VersionTracker

Georgia Traffic - checks GA traffic

IP Subnet Calculator - lets me check IP ranges and masks quickly and easily

Sing That iTune - puts lyrics into iTunes songs

[cdman98 @ Jul 8th 2007 1:14AM]

More news from iGadget

Did the envalope turn up from Cupertino? Because last I herd the iPhone doesn't print money.

[sammy @ Jul 8th 2007 2:04AM]

My vote - Nintendo Wii Finder:

http://www.outtastock.com/wiiwidget.html

Found me one quick.

[sean @ Jul 8th 2007 5:11AM]

My personal favourite widget is the BBC Listen Again widget.

http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/22371/bbc-listenagain-widget

It gives you quick access to the last week of radio shows from all the BBC radio channels.
You need to have Real Player installed.

[bugmeister @ Jul 8th 2007 6:51AM]

Personally I can't live without Say Cheese for checking my comics ;)

http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/19542

[qwert @ Jul 8th 2007 7:02AM]

how much more battery will i really gain if i turn of the dashboard?
if i look into activity monitor, i find that my widgets (roughly about ten pieces) are taking up nearly no cpu time, as long as the dashboard isnt loaded, and just idling in the background. and im not on some fancy new gazillion core rig, im on a single g4 12" ibook.

[Josh @ Jul 8th 2007 8:24AM]

Dashboard widgets are frigging slow. It is far faster to switch to my browser, type in a URL, and load a page with data (particularly from Google). I have a 2GHz MacBook with 2GB of RAM. I also have a Core Duo Mac Mini, a PowerBook G4, and a Pismo G3. On the PowerPC, Dashboard is excruciatingly slow. On the Intels it is bearable, but still slower than Safari, so why use Dashboard over Safari? The reason for this is because Safari has a high probability of being resident in memory (since one often uses Safari (or other browsers)), while Dashboard ends up getting swapped to disk and needs to be swapped back in (for each widget too!). Dashboard is just silly.

[eric f. @ Jul 8th 2007 11:02AM]

Airport Radar = AWESOME

[nicleT @ Jul 9th 2007 1:44PM]

Doesn't work here :(

[Stuart @ Jul 8th 2007 11:49AM]

I'm big on keeping my tags on my iTunes library up to date so I have the following widgets:

1. Sing that iTune - simply downloads lyrics for the song you're listening to and automatically saves the lyrics to the song.

2. Album Art - there are loads of widgets for downloading artwork, this one is my favourite it finds the art from your selected site and then if you want to add it you can choose to add to either one song or the entire album.

3. iTunes - simply lets you control iTunes while in Dashboard.

4. Stopwatch - simple stop watch 2 buttons Stop/Start and Reset.

5. Calculator - Very handy and simple to use.

6. Calendar - Always good to know what day it is.

7. I just downloaded the wireless radar, i like it.

[John @ Jul 8th 2007 1:39PM]

My office is two blocks from AT&T Park

I hate you.


Good list.

[Jeff Martin @ Jul 8th 2007 4:49PM]

The only widget I use is the Heap CRM widget. But it allows me to get access to the company contacts, messages, schedules, etc and search without having to open up safari.

[Forrest @ Jul 9th 2007 8:46AM]

I actually prefer JiWire WiFi Hotspot Finder. It seems faster more attractive, and more accurate. It also includes a hotspot finder that lists WiFi spots by location and can be narrowed by free and paid.

http://www.jiwire.com/osx-tiger-dashboard-widget.htm

[drifter @ Jul 9th 2007 11:34PM]

two you seem to have overlooked:

the Weatherbug widget (http://www.apple.com/downloads/dashboard/information/weatherbuglocalweather.html) which has more accurate temperatures than the built-in one because you can pick a weatherstation close to your house and it has radar and

book-bot.com widget
(http://www.apple.com/downloads/dashboard/reference/bookbotcomreader.html)
a great way to put a book into your dashboard so you can take a break from work, read a little, and then hide it instantly! no new books though.

[gbnyc @ Jul 12th 2007 12:13PM]

David Pogue wrote a column about the WiFi signal degradation that
Jiwire's widget can cause:
http://pogue.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/06/06/getting-the-most-out-of-your-wi-fi-menu/ .

I don't understand the problem well enough to know if Airport Radar
has the same problem. I followed his advice and use WiFind (not a
widget) and am very happy with it.

[aj @ Aug 15th 2007 9:01PM]

here are my two favorite widgets
http://www.apple.com/downloads/dashboard/justforfun/thinkgeekfortunewidget.html
http://www.apple.com/downloads/dashboard/shopping/thinkgeekwhatsnew.html