Touch the Widget

Before today I had never heard of Konfabulator much less a "widget." However, after spending a copious amount of time pouring over the Konfabulator site, I am now widget-dependent.

Widgets. I'm not quite sure how I lived without them before this...kind of like my iPod! It seems Mac owners have had the keys to the candy store for some time now and still, I'm not quite sure I'm ready to make the switch. Especially seeing as how operating systems have been converting programs back and forth so that any user of any system can have their piece of the pie...or apple.

Since Konfabulator is letting you download their program for free, I decided to not waste any time and see how much shit I could download into my C:My Documents/Program Files/Konfabulator/My Widgets. Immediately I sought out the appropriate widget(s) that would make my addiction to music all the more justafiable. Konfabulator is an "enabler."

Actually there were three of them. The first is a nifty widget called the iTunes Companion. It takes whatever song you are playing and finds the cover art on Amazon.com for you. It begins as a cute little naked jewel case then as each song rotates in, the "sleeve" slides into place. iTunes Companion also lets you link and purchase music right through iTunes itself! How cool is that! The second widget I downloaded was the iTunes remote. Pretty simple. It looks just like an iPod click wheel. This way, I can pause my music; an ideal widget for straight out playing songs from iTunes without getting all fancy with the iTunes Companion. The last one I found was a take on the iPod Shuffle. It works in combination with both the iTunes companion and iTunes remote. I probably don't have to explain what this one does. Usually I will have all three running because I just love watching the songs change through the iTunes companion and sometimes the iPod Shuffle function just doesn't cut it if you are in a Ministry mood and all you get is "Annie."
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There are a lot of other cool widgets out there that you can leave running on your desktop if you want. Some are beneficial, some are neat to have just "in case," and others are a complete waste of time.

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Orlando Traffic Updater

Wreck on Hwy 27? You're kidding me! Slowdown on I-4 due to a flat tire? Get out of here! No fatalities? Injustice!!!

I feel I must inform you that one of the other "useful" widgets I came across was a cheapest gas widget that searches for the cheapest gas in your zipcode. Now, why didn't you think of that?

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myFark News Feeder

Somewhat useless in a "serious news source" way but my God, why would you go to Fark.com for serious news anyway?! I love the Fark people. Their "Florida" category makes orange juice come out my nose.

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Cocoa Beach Cams Widget

I already know (and don't need to be told) that this is a stupid widget to have. First of all, it is called Cocoa Beach Cams but primarily features a view of Universal Studios. Why the hell do I care what is going on at Universal Studios?! I simply do not know, but it was a free download and I've only launched it once. Until someone makes a decent Orlando webcam widget that takes a picture of, let's say...the "proposed" IKEA site, this is all I've got.

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Hooray for sticky notes! I think every operating system comes with sticky notes already but I'm fascinated by their version none-the-less.

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Widget randomness

There are a lot of pretty useless widgets you can download and never utilize. I found a Simpson's random quote generator and even a Babelfish translator widget. Two that I just couldn't resist though were the HAL widget (from 2001: A Space Odyssey) and of course, the Lite-Brite widget!!!