Widgets and Gadgets

All the kids today are raving about the sidebar. For those of you that don't know, a sidebar is is a handy way to show information and applications on the side of your desktop. In reality you can move them anywhere, but most people keep them to the right side. Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft all have their own versions of these apps. Some are very useful for the super computer savvy trying to keep tabs on their computer's performance, like this one from Microsoft. Others, are pretty silly, but who can say "no" to a hungry kitty as it chases your mouse around the screen.

I use a combination of Yahoo's Widgets, and Microsoft's gadgets. Just by glancing at my sidebar you can tell I have some pretty nerd ones, not to mention zombies lurking in the background.

Up top I have a handy little e-mail notifier. It simply tells me ow many new messages in my inbox. Since the battery died in my Casio CA53W-1, I dropped two more apps, the clock comes standard with Vista, and the Calculator comes in handy a lot more than you would think. Not to mention you can customize the colors to fit your style.

My media player also comes from Microsoft. It's a solid little music player and from what I can tell it also plays video files. The one major problem I have with it is the player doesn't respond to the hot keys on my keyboard. So when ever Yanni comes on I have to minimize all my windows to skip tracks.

For pictures I opted for this picture frame from Polaroid. It's no secret that I love old School Polaroid pictures and am disgusted by the prices for these vintage visual loveys. So this has become a close second. Say "Hi" to Tom and Wee-Wee.

And at the bottom for all us bookworms I've docked a quick link to Dictionary.com for quick look-ups.

Hit up the comments to let me know if there are any really good apps out there I'm missing out on, or if you just want to brag about your sidebar Setup