April 24, 2007
Blimey! Nathan at the InsideMicrosoft blog is on a roll… Two roundups in two days!
Issue 9 of his regular series includes a mish-mash of the latest gadgets to be released. The SayaTV Gadget is interesting - in that it’s the first to offer live TV from the Sidebar.
I’m also a fan of Garfield, so I was pleased to see a gadget to display the comic daily - but it turned out to be pretty useless, so I’ll just have to keep visiting the site until I get a chance to release one that works properly!
Oh, and the Babe Slide Show Gadget has been upgraded to version 2. I still don’t see the fascination of seeing a thumnail of a bikini-clad girl in your Sidebar - but it’s getting an an awful lot of downloads!
I’m looking forward to Nathan’s 10th edition, which will apparently be an all-time best of the best special.
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April 23, 2007
Nathan Weinberg has just posted the eigth of his series of Gadget roundups on the InsideMicrosoft blog. As is typical, there’s details on a random selection of reasonably useful Sidebar goodies.
However, with three of them not working, one with errors, one that crashes your sidebar, and at least one that’s totally pointless (i.e. just pointing to a web page) - perhaps Nathan should consider removing the word ‘good’ from the title? I’d personally rather see a weekly roundup of the absolute best that there is out there, rather than a mediocre snapshot of everything. Sorry Nathan!
Definitely worth checking out for one or two though. SysInfo for example is an excellent multi-purpose clock!
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April 20, 2007
It was only a matter of time before developers realised that they could leverage the Vista Sidebar platform as a base for a substantial social network. Well that’s exactly what one enterprising coder has done with the release of his VistaShout Gadget. The gadget sits quietly in the sidebar, and expands to offer a familiar chat window.
In the four days since the gadget went live on the Microsoft Gallery page, it’s had over 3000 downloads - so I have a funny feeling that it wont be long before the network is buzzing. I can forsee some problems though, if Microsoft’s estimated 200 million users all decide to chat at once!
I have one issue with this gadget, and that’s the Google Adsense block that’s built into the main window. I firmly believe in not having advertising of that sort as part of a gadget interface. If you want to make some money from gadgets such as this then promote your business through the options screen!
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April 19, 2007
Firstly, let me apologise for the lack of a decent post for the last couple of days. I’ve been under pressure to complete a client’s project on time, and today it was my 30th birthday.
So, everything will be back to normal tomorrow, but for now feel free to have a look at my new personal blog - paulenderson.com. I set it up today as a way to celebrate the start of my fourth decade on this planet!
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April 17, 2007
If you’ve worked through the initial tutorials for building gadgets, and you’re looking to take things to the next level, then there’s a fantastic tutorial by Jan Kucera to see at The Code Project. It takes you through the steps required to make yourself a Garfield daily cartoon gadget, and covers more advance topics than most.
The one thing it doesn’t do (at the author’s own admission) is gently hold your hand with step-by-step instructions. If that’s where you are with it, then that’s not a problem though - as there’s a simpler tutorial by Mark J Miller on the same site.
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April 16, 2007
As reported by Stefan Stranger, Microsoft are running an interesting webcast on April 18th at 2pm EST (that’s 9am GMT for me). It’ll run for about an hour and a half, and cover building gadgets using HTML and JavaScript, using ASP.NET AJAX for gadget service calls, and taking gadgets beyond basic technologies with things like ActiveX and WPF.
Should you attend? Well, I reckon this will be useful for existing developers who want to understand how to build Sidebar Gadgets for Windows Vista. It will apparently feature a little bit of PowerPoint and a lot of demonstration!
You’ll need to register with Microsoft if you plan to join the cast. Maybe I’ll see you there?
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April 15, 2007
AOL are inviting everybody to test out a brand new Vista Sidebar Gadget: the AOL Search Gadget.
The AOL Search Gadget allows you to easily search the web from your desktop sidebar, and shows current Hot Searches - providing you with one click access to what’s hot on AOL. With Hot Searches, you can easily see what people are searching for, including breaking news, sports, and entertainment.
If you fancy taking part in the beta then visit the AOL Beta Central page and give it a spin!
I have a couple of comments for the AOL devs. Firstly, it would be a nicer solution if the results were displayed in the sidebar too, rather than opening a web page. Secondly, please make the default search box text dissappear when the user clicks in it. Feel free to contact me for testing updates though guys!
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April 14, 2007
Vista Sidebar Gadgets are wonderful, aren’t they? You can do just about everything with a gadget - from checking your Googlemail, to letting you know that your website is down, and even helping you post to your blog.
But all that’s a bit boring, right? Sometimes I think we all need to just switch our brains off and play with something completely pointless. But guess what? There’s gadgets for that too!
Bubble Wrap by Team Blackshirt. Pop some plastic bubbles as a fun way to pass time, or to annoy others. You can even change the colour of the bubble wrap to fit in with your desktop theme!
Voodoo Doll by Team Blackshirt. Name your victim, and then click various parts of the nicely animated body to place the pins. Let the torture begin!
Snack by Team Blackshirt. Click those eatin’ irons to take a bite (sound effects ‘n’ all). When you’ve eaten it all up it removes itself from the Sidebar.
Magic 8-Ball by TechShooter. Click on the instantly recognisable ball for help with your problems, to predict the future, or to decide what colour socks to wear.
Spirit Detector by ShaunNZ. Select the spirit you want to look out for, and it will alert you when they’re near your computer. Choices include Santa, John Lennon and Elvis (of course).
So… Did I miss any? What do you do to have fun with your Sidebar?
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