Wednesday June 30

Dashboard

A few years from now, all the people slamming Apple for "copying" Konfabulator will look back and feel foolish. I believe that the omnipresence of Dashboard will have a huge impact on the way Mac desktop apps are developed, resulting in an explosion of widgets that Konfabulator could never have inspired.

Witih Dashboard, any Mac app can improve the usability of some of its features by supplying widgets to monitor and operate them. Off the top of my head I can imagine stuff like a download manager widget for Firefox, a compilation progress widget for XCode, or a photo slideshow widget for iPhoto. Just look at the iTunes, iCal, and Address Book widgets that Apple is demoing - I'd bet that at least 30% of the times you'd open the full apps could be spared in favor of a quick Expose glance. Someday, users may frown upon applications that don't come with companion widgets.

So, while Dashboard may be a copy of Konfabulator, I believe that Apple will be vindicated in the long run once users see how valuable widgets are as an integral part of the platform.