Mom... Meet Your Dashboard. Dashboard... This is My Mom.
One of the cool newer features mac offers is the dashboard and widgets. You can access your dashboard by clicking on the dashboard icon in your dock. You can also open your dashboard with the keyboard shortcut of F12.
Once you've done that, you see that your screen darkens a little, and several new items, called widgets appear all over your screen. The shot below shows some basic default widgets, such as calendar, calculator and local time.
These widgets connect through the internet and are always loaded with the most recent information. You can select from countless widgets that will appear on your dashboard and give you all kinds of useful, or useless knowledge. For example, some of the more basic widgets will give you local weather, movie times, and gas prices. I personally have widgets that show the weekly box office grosses, overnight television ratings and the weather in my most favorite city in the world, San Francisco.
Think of widgets of little mini programs. They are simple and lightweight and give you quick information in a fun, visual way, but individually, they don't really do all that much. They're like computer versions of the little coupons, magnetic calendars and post-it notes you might put on your refrigerator door.
Since widgets are easy to design, there are a lot of different ones available, and they can be created by just about anyone!
To get a new dashboard widget, go to the lower left of your screen when dashboard is open, and click on the plus sign in the circle. This opens the WIDGETS BAR (incidentally, when you have the widgets bar open, you'll notice that the plus sign in the circle changes to an x).
Here you see numerous additional widgets that mac has already installed for you to add to your dashboard should you want them. To get one of these widgets added to your dashboard, you can simply click on it, and it will be added immediately (with a nice ripple effect to boot). Then you can move them to the space where you want them to reside. Or you can click on the widget you are choosing and HOLD THE CLICK DOWN and immediately position the widget where you would like it to go.
As long as you have the widget bar open, each widget you have on your dashboard has an "x in a circle" button in its top. left corner. Clicking that will close out that widget, and it will no longer be on your dashboard until you put it there again.
Tomorrow, I'll show you some specific widgets, and where you can go to choose from lots and lots more!
Once you've done that, you see that your screen darkens a little, and several new items, called widgets appear all over your screen. The shot below shows some basic default widgets, such as calendar, calculator and local time.
These widgets connect through the internet and are always loaded with the most recent information. You can select from countless widgets that will appear on your dashboard and give you all kinds of useful, or useless knowledge. For example, some of the more basic widgets will give you local weather, movie times, and gas prices. I personally have widgets that show the weekly box office grosses, overnight television ratings and the weather in my most favorite city in the world, San Francisco.
Think of widgets of little mini programs. They are simple and lightweight and give you quick information in a fun, visual way, but individually, they don't really do all that much. They're like computer versions of the little coupons, magnetic calendars and post-it notes you might put on your refrigerator door.
Since widgets are easy to design, there are a lot of different ones available, and they can be created by just about anyone!
To get a new dashboard widget, go to the lower left of your screen when dashboard is open, and click on the plus sign in the circle. This opens the WIDGETS BAR (incidentally, when you have the widgets bar open, you'll notice that the plus sign in the circle changes to an x).
Here you see numerous additional widgets that mac has already installed for you to add to your dashboard should you want them. To get one of these widgets added to your dashboard, you can simply click on it, and it will be added immediately (with a nice ripple effect to boot). Then you can move them to the space where you want them to reside. Or you can click on the widget you are choosing and HOLD THE CLICK DOWN and immediately position the widget where you would like it to go.
As long as you have the widget bar open, each widget you have on your dashboard has an "x in a circle" button in its top. left corner. Clicking that will close out that widget, and it will no longer be on your dashboard until you put it there again.
Tomorrow, I'll show you some specific widgets, and where you can go to choose from lots and lots more!
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