I like the Dashboard in Apple's Mac OS X 10.4. What I don't like is how much screen real estate some of those widgets use. Unfortunately, Windows users don't know what I'm talking about since Dashboard is not Windows compatible. Check out Konfabulator. This program is similar to Dashboard and works with both Mac and Windows.
Both Dashboard and Konfabulator make use of widgets, tiny applications that do one or two things and those one or two things well.
The showcase widgets for both applications are the ones for showing you the weather. You can also get widgets that will update you on sports scores, play Asteroids or Frogger, show current gasoline prices in your area, et cetera.
Another difference beetween Dashboard and Konfabulator is how much space the widgets use. The folks who build widgets for Konfabulator get it. Their widgets don't take up as much needless space as Dashboard widgets.
Still, check out both Dashboard and Konfabulator. There are some great and fun widgets.
