Today, we will learn about “Windows Gadgets”, to make our Windows Desktop more eye-catching.
However, Microsoft has retired this feature in the newer version of Windows. This is because Windows Sidebar platform has some serious vulnerabilities issues, which could harm your computer, show you objectionable contents, or could change their behavior at any time. An attacker even can take full control of your computer, using Gadgets.
Windows Gadgets are mini-programs, which provide easy access to frequently used tasks. For instance, you can use “Gadgets”, to display a nice “Clock” on your Desktop, “News Headlines”, or a “Picture Slideshow”. There are hundreds of Gadgets are freely available. You can even display gadget on top of your other applications, like News Headline. This way you can keep track of Latest News, while you are working, and you don’t have to open a web-site to see the latest news.
To add a Gadget to your Desktop, right-click on an empty area of your Desktop, and click Gadgets. Windows will then display you available list of Gadgets, which are currently installed on your system. These are some available Gadgets, which get pre-installed with Windows 7.
Double-click on a Gadget, that you wish to have on your Desktop. You can also drag and drop Gadgets to your Desktop, or can choose “Add” by right-clicking on a particular Gadget.
You can also add multiple instance of a Gadget. For instance, if you want to track the time of two different zones, then you can add two instances of Clock gadget, and later you can configure their properties, to show different time zones.
When you point your mouse pointer over a Gadget, then 3 common buttons appear, which are Close, Options, and Drag Gadget.
To remove a Gadget, right-click on the Gadget, and click “Close Gadget”, or you can also click on the Close button, available on top right corner of every Gadget.
You can place your Gadgets anywhere on your Desktop. Just hold down a Gadget, and place it anywhere you want, or you can also move a Gadget by holding it from “Drag Gadget” button.
Every Gadget has its own Properties. For instance, if you choose “Options” for Clock, then you will see different settings than Slide Show options. You also have additional “Large Size” button for Slide Show, which is not available in “Clock” gadget.
As I have placed two instances of Clock gadgets, now I can set different Time Zones for both, by clicking on Options button.
For Slide Show Gadget, I can choose my favorite picture folder to display as slide show. I can also configure the time for each picture to display in Gadget, and even I can have Transition effects between pictures. Shuffle option will pick and display random pictures within from folder.
If you click on “Get more gadgets online” link, then this will then open the same warning page, as I had discussed before. If you’re concerned about the safety of your computer and gadgets, then you can completely disable Windows Sidebar and Gadgets using “Automatically Fix It” link, available on this page.
In my opinion, the inbuilt Gadgets of Windows 7 are safe to use, but there are thousands of third-party gadgets are available on Internet, and it is not predictable that how much safe they are to use?
In our next lesson, we will learn about some more great features of Windows 7. Do subscribe to our channel, as there are a lot more videos to come. Till then, good bye and have a nice day.
Comments
Post a Comment