To Widget or not

[Lobo]

I see alot of apps that say now with widget or people saying make a wisdget for this app.. What benefit is there to making a widget... sorry if its a noob question but you can add any app to homescreen by the long press why need widget.. im assuming it has to do with memory/battery use?

 

[tiredhiker]

True BUT with a Wiget the icon can be live in other words a weather Wiget can display temp and rain/clouds/sunshine graphic. A Wiget is ALIVE !!!

 

[punkzanyj]

I see alot of apps that say now with widget or people saying make a wisdget for this app.. What benefit is there to making a widget... sorry if its a noob question but you can add any app to homescreen by the long press why need widget.. im assuming it has to do with memory/battery use?

Widgets are live/dynamic content, without having to open an full-screen app.

For example:

WeatherBug has a widget that puts the weather on your homescreen, complete with graphics and if you press the widget you're taken to the full application.

The Calendar now has a widget. So you can see what's next on your agenda without having to open the application. Again, pressing this widget opens the full calendar application.

There are several news widgets that will put headlines and even snippets of news stories right on your desktop, updated every hour or however often you want them updated.

There are widgets that are basically icons that update.

For example, there's one that looks identical to the messaging icon, but it's a widget. When you get new sms/mms messages the widget updates with a counter showing how many unread messages you have. Clicking the widget takes you to the messaging app just like the normal icon does but the normal icon doesn't have that updated counter.

TasKiller has a widget that shows how many running apps you have, and if you press the TasKiller widget it kills all of them.


Right now I have the calendar widget, the TasKiller Widget, a Twitter Widget, and a Timer Widget. Which means I can see/use all of this content from my home screen without having to open an full app. Particularly with the Twitter TasKiller, and Calendar widgets, the advantage is being able to see what's going on without having to open the application.

A lot of apps update in the background, when the developer adds a widget, it's just a faster/easier way to see those updates.

 

[Lobo]

ok thanks.. so in essence power consumption wise.. a widget is worse for sucking power.. for example i couldnt find a weather widget i liked because it either didnt do celcius right or it seemed to suck my battery too fast so i use moxier world.. so i click it once and weather pops up.. but i get what you mean.. thanks

 

[punkzanyj]

ok thanks.. so in essence power consumption wise.. a widget is worse for sucking power.. for example i couldnt find a weather widget i liked because it either didnt do celcius right or it seemed to suck my battery too fast so i use moxier world.. so i click it once and weather pops up.. but i get what you mean.. thanks

really depends on the widget and how often it updates. my timer widget is always showing up in taskiller, but the calendar widget never does.

 

[Lobo]

speaking of taskkiller.. the new one you just click it and it kills all... not sure if i like that.. i would like to see whats actually running all the time