Windows Vista Team Blog : Windows Vista, Windows Sidebar

Check out these Live Search Gadgets

Nick White — Sat, 10 Mar 2007 02:06:00 GMT

The Live Search Team has released 2 new Windows Sidebar Gadgets for Windows Vista.

Live Search Traffic Gadget

The new Live Search Traffic Gadget uses Live Search Maps to bring up-to-date local traffic information right to your Windows Vista desktop. The gadget display includes shortcuts to driving directions, local search and a full-screen view of traffic in Live Search Maps. Currently supported are the following cities:

· Atlanta

· Boston

· Chicago

· Denver

· Detroit

· Houston

· Los Angeles

· Milwaukee

· New York

· Oklahoma City

· Philadelphia

· Phoenix

· Pittsburgh

· Portland

· Providence

· Sacramento

· Salt Lake City

· San Diego

· San Francisco

· Seattle

· St Louis

· Tampa

· Washington, DC

Download the Live Search Traffic Gadget from Windows Live Gallery.

Live Search Gadget

The team has also released a Sidebar Gadget that allows access to Live Search directly from your desktop. It’ll accept your search query and render the results directly within the Gadget. You can set up custom searches using Live Search Macros in the gadget’s Settings pane as well.

Download the Live Search Gadget from Windows Live Gallery.

It's Windows Vista Week at Channels 9 and 10

Nick White — Tue, 27 Feb 2007 18:21:00 GMT

Windows Vista Week has begun at Channel 9 and Channel 10. Over on Channel 9 they're covering Windows Vista from the developer side, focusing on building apps for Windows Vista as a user-centric operating system. What technologies underlying Windows Vista make it what it is for the user? And what can developers get out of those technologies to improve the user's experience with their Windows apps? Channel 9 will take a deep-dive into those technologies this week. Expect topics to range from UAC to the networking stack and beyond.

Also, Channel 9's Charles Torre has posted his interview with Michael Wallent on the 'what' and 'why' of Windows Vista's developer appeal. Incidentally, I had the opportunity to interview Michael about Windows Vista product quality back in November, and he had some illuminating things to share, so I'm sure his words for devs will be equally valuable.

On Channel 10, the team will be covering a wide range of Windows Vista topics, too, in this case targeting power users (is that you?). For instance, Tina Wood works hands-on with Ernie Booth while installing Windows Vista, and Laura Foy interviews Windows Mobile's Mel Sampat (creator of FlexWallet) about getting Windows Sidebar Gadgets to run on your Windows Mobile device.

Should be an interesting week ...

New Microsoft Outlook Gadgets for Windows Sidebar

Nick White — Tue, 05 Dec 2006 17:21:00 GMT

Ryan Gregg, Program Manager for Microsoft Outlook, has announced on his blog two new Outlook Gadgets for Windows Sidebar, both of which bring Outlook to your desktop for easy, real-time access. Go here to download the Outlook Upcoming Appointments Gadget, and here for the Outlook Tasks Gadget.

These two gadgets are a great example of Windows Vista and 2007 Office System working in tandem -- both patch into your Outlook 2007 settings to use the same display theme you're currently using in Outlook, and also allow you to open the respective task or appointment simply by double-clicking it in the gadget.

Countdown gadget now appearing live on the blog

Nick White — Tue, 28 Nov 2006 20:14:00 GMT

Last week we'd mentioned the Windows Vista Countdown Gadget -- now we've gone and added it to our site so that it appears on every page !

Go here to get the gadget for your site, Live.com page and Windows Live Space.

Counting Down to the Consumer Launch of Windows Vista

Nick White — Wed, 22 Nov 2006 19:37:00 GMT

On 30 January 2007, Microsoft will be making Windows Vista available to the world at large. This event goes by different monikers: "general availability," "GA" and "retail availability" are some of them. But no matter what it's called, lots of people -- I for one -- are looking forward to that day. As excitement builds, we've seen that some enthusiasts are marking the occasion in different ways; one to just recently hit our radar is Donavon West's design of a Windows Sidebar Gadget that counts down the days, hours and seconds until midnight of GA Day.

Donavon has created three similar versions of his gadget: one for Live.com pages, another for Windows Live Spaces, and a third for installation to the Windows Vista Sidebar.

Why not join Donavon and us in the countdown to retail availability by placing the gadget on your own website? Just add the following code snippet to your site to display the Windows Vista Countdown Gadget, just as it looks on Live.com:

<div style="position:relative;width:130px;height:142px;">

<script src="http://download.gallery.start.com/d.dll/1~1~485~4304/VistaCountdown.js" type="text/javascript"></script>

</div>

Have we ever got some exciting things planned for retail availability ... stay tuned !