I was checking out a friends new vista program and they now have widgets....

[Seedersandleechers]

At least what looked and acted like widgets. But they don't call them that. Imagine ...I guess MS is still stealing apple ideas..Or am I out of line...

[reprobate]

1. Not out of line. Microshaft has a history of copying other companies innovations.

Apple's widgets came out several years ago, and now suddenly M$ has the same technology.

Would you draw any conclusion from that? I sure do.

[Seedersandleechers]

3. I wonder how MS gets around copyright laws..

Picture to picture the widgets looked almost exactly the same....

[Seedersandleechers]

4. Actually I found this...

MS calls them gadgets



Microsoft Copies Mac OS X (Again)
File under: Software
Posted on Thursday, September 15, 2005 at 13:15 by Sven Rafferty


If you haven’t been looking at all the screen shots of the mega-delayed Longhorn Windows Vista, then you’ve been missing the brushed metal folders, gel-like buttons that glow, and glass like interface that just keeps shouting “Aqua!” when you look at it. While Apple has been giving the lucky 5% of the total OS market new innovation nearly every 15 months, it seems Microsoft just copies it…and will eventually get it out. But not to be out done by Apple and produce something more viable then tabbed browsing that we’ve all been doing for years now with IE7, Microsoft one upped themselves in the rip-off department and has introduced Microsoft Gadgets.

Gadgets you ask? Is that like Widgets? Mmm, do you think? Kinda looks like it to me. The clock is there, the RSS reader, mini-remote for the music player, and the weather forecast. Yup, I’d say those are widgets. Microsoft claim this has been in the works for a long time, originating from their Sidebar project (another rip off but of third-party vendors) way back to 2001. “The concept of Gadgets for the Windows Desktop is one that has a long lineage, dating back to Microsoft research projects and prior,” is what the Gadget’s blog tells the unsuspecting reader to give the sense that MS has invented something really cool, again. But they forget to tell the reader that, one, it’s not out yet, and two, it is out now. What? Well, the later is only true if you’re running OS X 10.4. Sorry, didn’t mean to confuse you.

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[133724]

10. Yea.. just comparee Windoz to the KDE desktop in Linux... Talk about stealing S/W....

[Poiuyt]

2. Someone said that Windows XP is just an unreliable Mac OS 6

with a higher price tag

[Captain Angry]

5. Microsoft stole from Apple, who stole from Konfabulator.

Konfabulator Widgets were out WAY before Apple put them into Tiger. In fact, they ported Konfabulator to Windows out of anger for Apple doing their set and calling them Widgets.

Konfabulator was then bought by Yahoo, who maintains both Windows and Apple compatible applications. Programming for Yahoo! Widgets is very easy, and there are thousands of them.

The Vista Gadgets are kind of nice that they can store in one place without having do hit F12, and you can drag them to the desktop.

All in all, any little widget is nice if it is well written. Some widgets look awesome, but are so badly programmed that they'll eat memory until the system crashes.

[moggie]

7. You can leave Mac widgets on the desktop too

Hit F12, click on the '+' to bring up the widget bar, and click and hold on the widget you want on the bar. While holding the mouse button, hit F12 again. You'll end up with Dashboard closed and your chosen widget on the desktop.

[Captain Angry]

8. Well, I'll be.

Thank for the neat trick.

I didn't know that one, and it worked great.

[moggie]

9. The widget will go from the desktop next time you open Dashboard

If you don't like this, you can use Dashboard's dev mode to keep a widget on the desktop permanently:

Open a terminal, and type: defaults write com.apple.dashboard devmode YES
Log out and in again
Hit F12 to open Dashboard
Start dragging the widget you want, and hit F12 again while holding the mouse button

To remove the widget again, just drag it and hit F12 while the button is down. To disable dev mode again, use 'defaults write com.apple.dashboard devmode NO' and logout and in again.

[alfredo]

11. Check out Amnesty Generator. It will convert Google Gadgets

into Widgets. It's free.

[bullimiami]

6. everyone keeps stealing everyone elses good ideas.

i never liked the widgets in tiger, they steal processing even when they are off. uninstalled them all almost immediately.
i have the same opinion about the vista faux widgets which ive disabled as well.

[davidwparker]

12. "let the copiers begin" is the usually said after Apple presents new features

to the public at its conferences. MS has no shame.