Mainly a reminder for myself but if your looking for the folder where the sidebar gadgets are installed

C:\User\Username\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows Sidebar\Gadgets

Each .gadget file is a compressed file that contains all the files that make up the gadget

Currently i have the following gadgets on my sidebar

Gmail Checker – Nice gadget that lets you know when you have new gmail

Server Ping – Nice little gadget that gives me green lights when my servers are up!

Outlook To-Do List - Does what it says on the tin

Slideshow – Roates pictures of my little girl. Who needs photo sellotaped to the screen! (read my tip on that here)

Notes - Little tear off style notes..currently holds my panda golf level password <blush>

WordPress – Miniture dashboard for this blog. Gives me quick access to common functions such as Write, bookmark, dashboard

I do think that the sidebar will eventually mature as more business style apps appear for it. I’ve got loads of ideas that i need to get round to planning out properly

Over on the Live Search blog they have released a couple of new sidebar gadgets

While i like the look of the traffic information gadget i’m in the UK so it’s of no use to me

I do like the Live Search Gadget. Simply drop it on your sidebar and type in your search term.

The results appear in a pop out window. It is also configurable and lets you search specific sites and use search macros
I have one request though…

“Can we have regional settings please?”

When i use live search (or google) i frequently tick the “only show me sites from the UK” box.

Other than that keep up the good work!

My first Vista tip!

I’m loving the sidebar at the moment. I changed the options so that it is always on top and dropped a couple of useful things on there.

Clock, it’s a bit more visible than the clock in the system tray.

Remote Desktop Connection Gadget - allows me to quickly Remote Desktop into any of the servers i’m looking after

Slideshow – I use this to cycle pictures of my daughter

So i dropped the slideshow gadget onto the sidebar. Created a search to only find pictures that are tagged with my daughers name and i tried to point the gadget at the search…no not happening.

I was a little bit annoyed that i couldn’t do this. It meant i’d have to create a seperate folder and it starts to do away with the whole “tagging” feature (which i really love btw!)

Anyway a bit of digging this morning comes up with the following from the sidebar team blog

1)      Create an actual folder

2)      Perform a search of pictures

3)      Save search to created folder

4)      Point the Slideshow gadget at the created folder

5)      Make sure “Include subfolders”  is checked

Lo and behold it works!