Widgets and desktop enhancements

The Webware 100 is going strong, and if you're still in the voting mood, Digg has unveiled their list of 10 finalists for their API visualization contest, which can be voted on by--you guessed it--digging. Like Digg Expose, which I wrote about earlier this week (and is coincidentally a nominee), each of the finalists has found some really neat ways to play with Digg user data.

One of the most interesting aspects of this contest is the use of Adobe Apollo. Four of the 10 finalists' offerings are served up as Apollo apps, which is fairly impressive considering how … Read more

I'm trying to figure out what the hubbub is about the My Yahoo competitor Pageflakes tonight. Both TechCrunch and Mashable have just fallen over each other to cover what appears to be somewhat minor news about Pageflakes. These stories (and, obviously, this one too) are based on an embargoed press release that Pageflakes CEO Dan Cohen sent out last night, in which he boasts that, "over 100,000 Pagecasters...are enriching the lives of millions of Internet users around the world."

In English, this means that Pageflakes' community features are a success. And although the hype around … Read more

The Wall Street Journal has a scoopy story about Facebook's forthcoming announcement on Thursday. The report says Facebook will be opening itself up for other companies to add their wares in the form of branded pages and services made available to Facebook users on different networks.

Previously, Facebook's strategy for adding this content was in the form of specialty groups, which Facebook members had to join in order to access or gain benefit from. According to the WSJ, these services will now be integrated as standalone portions of the service and will be available without leaving the social … Read more

Got late word from Yahoo today about the company's new update of My Yahoo, due to roll out at 9:00 PM PDT tonight. As it turns out, I already have access to the features. So this report is based on hands-on access to the new service. We also covered an earlier version of the new My Yahoo back in March.

There are a few new modules available to My Yahoo users, like improved calendar and bookmarks widgets. The biggest update, though, is a new method to update your personal page, called "inline personalization." Now you don'… Read more

This nearly slipped by our radar last week, but in the latest build of the upcoming chat client Trillian Astra, Cerulean Studios has snuck in desktop versions of its widgets. Users can now place widgets in their Trillian buddy list or right on their desktop, similar to what you'd get with the Yahoo Widget engine, or other desktop widget tools. Users are also able to send them between the buddy list and desktop via right clicking, or they can simply drag and drop.

For now there are just five sample widgets, but assuming Cerulean Studios opens things up a bit, or goes with universal widget coding, Trillian users could get what is typically two applications in one, along with a wide array of desktop widgets.

Customizing the widgets is a little harder than it should be, as you can't just configure each one once it's on your desktop. Everything is handled through a preferences menu, although I'm assuming this will be changed as the application gets closer to release. Some sample widgets do look neat; the weather widget in particular is easy to read and fully animated. And the world-time widget shows when the sun is hitting your current location, which is totally nerd eye-candy.

Similar to other widget tools, Astra has a hot key that let users pull up all the running widgets at the same time. Pressing the Windows key and space bar accomplishes this easily, although it doesn't have nearly the same effect you get with OS X's Dashboard widget.

I wouldn't recommend you ditch your current widget engine just yet, since this is a brand-new feature on an application that's still in private alpha. I am, however, excited to see if this feature will be integrated into the forthcoming browser-free version of the app.

For more shots of the new widget runtime environment, keep reading.… Read more

Flickr quietly launched a new version of its slide show feature today. The new design forgoes the once small black box and takes over your entire browser window with full-sized photos that fade into one another. Also tweaked is the speed control, which has gone from a slow to fast slider to one-click options for slow, medium, and fast. Flickr decided to retool the slide show feature based on user feedback, as the previous version would restrict photos down to small size, even on large monitors or browsers set to full screen. The new version will simply resize itself to … Read more

MySpace has acquired photo-sharing site Photobucket, according to a report on the Valleywag blog.

The deal could be announced as early as Monday afternoon, according to the blog.

Photobucket, the largest photo-sharing site on the Web with more than 40 million registered users, engaged in a public relations battle recently with MySpace.

MySpace accused Photobucket of violating its terms of agreement by "encouraging" its users to post advertisements in the photo slide shows they posted to MySpace.

Note: This post was cross-posted from a CNET News.com story.

Update: The deal has been confirmed, and is now set … Read more

Gspell is a great little add-on for Mac users to add system-wide spelling recommendations from Google search results. For 10.4 users, Tiger's had spell-checking from the New Oxford American Dictionary built in, but even that has its limits when it comes to brand-new words and company names. Gspell's solution is to search Google to find spelling recommendations based on top results. This comes in handy when typing in people's last names, or site names that are slight variations of real words, such as Digg, Yelp, and CNET.

Gspell does have a few limitations. For one, it … Read more

The public release for Joost is very close. Today, the makers of the media service announced a content distribution deal with Turner Broadcasting, and forthcoming content from big names like Sports Illustrated, the NHL, and Sony Pictures Television (makers of Seinfeld and The Shield). Hasbro is also pitching in with the now classic series: G.I. JOE: A Real American Hero, as well as the original series of Transformers.

What may be the most interesting announcement though, is that current Joost beta testers will soon be given unlimited invitations to send to friends. This is typically a move that indicates … Read more