< A href="http://www.apple.com">Apple has posted the winners of its 2nd Dashboard Widget Contest, a competition announced in December of 2004 for developers to make the best dashboard Widget. The company chose Send SMS, developed by Alco Blom, and WikityWidget, developed by Michael Robinette. Each won a 40 GB iPod and "public recognition" for their work.
Dashboard is a feature in Appleis forthcoming Mac OS X update, Tiger, that allows users to run small applications with a very small footprint in terms of both screen real estate and system resources. Similar to Konfabulator in functionality and appearance, Dashboard brings the idea of widgets to the forefront of the Mac world, and has been one of the features that Apple has pushed the hardest when talking about Tiger, which will be released later this year.
The winners
The aptly named Send SMS is a widget that allows users to send SMS messages from your Mac to devices like cell phones without launching another application.
Apple described it as follows: "Send SMS provides the ability to send a message on the spur of the moment to someone without having to launch the Address Book application. Send SMS combines the instantly available Tiger Dashboard with Short Message Service, or SMS. SMS is a text message service that enables short messages of generally no more than 140-160 characters in length to be sent and transmitted from a cell phone."
A screen shot of Send SMS, as provided by Apple
WickityWidget is a notepad widget that allows users to take notes, complete with hypertext links, and have them all organized from a simple interface.
Apple described it as follows: "WikityWidget is a personal notepad with automatic linking. Using a simple notebook-style interface, WikityWidget lets you easily jot down and organize notes with hypertext links so theyire easy to find and instantly available via the Mac OS X Tiger Dashboard."
A screen shot of WikityWidget, as provided by Apple
There is additional information on both widgets, including more screen shots of each, at Appleis developer Web site for Dashboard.