In Mac OS X Leopard, the functionality of Dashboard has been extended to allow you to create widgets directly from any web page. Launch Dashboard A default installation of Mac OS X will include the Dashboard icon. On the Dock You activate Dashboard by clicking the icon or hitting the F12 (default hotkey) key on the keyboard.
Cocktail
Can you mix an, um, Apple Martini? Kamikaze? Or Piper at the Gates of Dawn? The free Cocktail widget powered by 7.com lets you impress buddies with your mixologist skills. Just type the drink you have in mind. Cocktail’s database includes nearly 7,000 drink recipes. Click Feelin Thirsty? for a random selection.
Countdown Plus
Steven Chaitoff’s simple Countdown Plus widget tells you how much time is remaining until a specified date, such as the newborn’s due date, your next vacation, your anniversary, or the day you’ll be paroled.
Daily Dilbert Widget
If you work in an office environment, you’ll love this widget, which delivers Scott Adams’ cartoon strip to your Mac every day. The latest seven comic strips are promised at any given time.
Daily Dilbert Widget
If you work in an office environment, you’ll love this widget, which delivers Scott Adams’ cartoon strip to your Mac every day. The latest seven comic strips are promised at any given time.
Mac Tips and Tricks
Mac Tips and Tricks does what its name suggests − it’s a springboard to tips on all things Macintosh, from listening to music through multiple speakers via AirPlay to fine-tuning the volume on your computer. Check out the widget for other tricks.
Movies
Want to know the flicks playing in the hood? Want to read a synopsis and view trailers to help you decide which to see? That’s just what Movies, a simple film fan widget from Apple, lets you do. Apple supplied the widget with OS X. It even lets you purchase tickets (via Fandango). It’s one of the widgets that has exhibited cranky behavior of late, so hopefully Apple will provide the, um, direction, it needs. In the meantime, anyone up for Hitchcock?
Power Switch
Press (or rather click) this single button in the Dashboard to make something happen on your Mac. What that something is depends on what happens when you click the “i” to configure the widget. You can put the Mac to sleep, log out, restart, or shut down, all after that single click.
You can fine-tune these actions. For example, you can place check marks that will close all Finder windows, empty the trash, eject network volumes, and secure the system. You can have the computer announce all these actions out loud too.
By dragging the slider, you can delay the start before the behavior takes hold, between 0 and 7,000 seconds after you press the button. The button itself will pulsate leading up to the start of the actions you requested.
Power Switch
Press (or rather click) this single button in the Dashboard to make something happen on your Mac. What that something is depends on what happens when you click the “i” to configure the widget. You can put the Mac to sleep, log out, restart, or shut down, all after that single click.
You can fine-tune these actions. For example, you can place check marks that will close all Finder windows, empty the trash, eject network volumes, and secure the system. You can have the computer announce all these actions out loud too.
By dragging the slider, you can delay the start before the behavior takes hold, between 0 and 7,000 seconds after you press the button. The button itself will pulsate leading up to the start of the actions you requested.
Quote of the Day
“Silence may be as variously shaded as speech.” Edith Wharton said that. “A true friend is one soul in two bodies.” Aristotle said that. Start your day with the Quote of the Day widget for these and other pearls of wisdom and a photo or illustration of the person who said them.
Starry Night Widget
Want to know what you’re looking at in the evening sky? This interactive planetarium widget can reveal the answers. Click the “i” and then the Time/Place tab to enter your current whereabouts or some other location.
If you place a check mark in the Now box (assuming that it’s not already checked), you’ll be able to identify the galactic objects in the immediate sky. But you can also enter another date or hour — well into the future or deep in the past — to see how space appeared or will appear at that time. You can also display star and planet labels, and constellations.
Translate
If you need to quickly translate a word or phrase, the aptly named Translate widget provides a handy tool. You can translate words to or from English and Chinese (Simplified or Traditional), Dutch, French, German, Greek, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, Russian, and Spanish.
Translate
If you need to quickly translate a word or phrase, the aptly named Translate widget provides a handy tool. You can translate words to or from English and Chinese (Simplified or Traditional), Dutch, French, German, Greek, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, Russian, and Spanish.
Word of the Day
Improve your vocabulary with this widget, which serves up daily definitions from Merriam-Webster.com, Dictionary.com, UrbanDictionary.com, or any of the other sources that developer Code Driven lets you pick from.
First introduced with OS X Tiger in 2005, Dashboard organizes Mac widgets — program shortcuts and precursors to apps that we are all more familiar with. Many of these widgets still come as part of the standard package with every Mac and new operating system.
Dashboard is useful to keep close at hand. Mac widgets include contacts (which you can sync with iOS contacts), to calculators, flight trackers to stock market information, the weather app, games, and a wide range of extra tools you can add when you tap the + icon in the lower left of the Apple dashboard.
If you want to take a look at what you can access via the Dashboard, here is the complete list of 1703 Widgets currently available and supported. Now, here is how you use the macOS Dashboard to improve your productivity.
Mac Dashboard shortcuts
Since MacOS Yosemite was launched, Dashboard is something you may have to enable to use. On Macs using an older operating system it is something that automatically sits in the Dock.
To enable Dashboard:
Go to System Preferences > Mission Control
Click the Dashboard pop-up menu
Here it gives you options for how Dashboard appears:
- As Space: Dashboard can inhabit its own area of your Desktop. Get to it when you press the keyboard shortcut for Dashboard, or move between spaces. There are a few other ways you can use space on your Desktop which we will outline below.
- As Overlay: Dashboard occupies a permanent space on your Desktop (which you can switch off via Mission Control).
Now that Dashboard is enabled, there are several ways you can access it (and set shortcut to give you access quicker). Access Dashboard through one of the following shortcuts:
Use Launchpad > Open > Dashboard.
Using Siri. Open Siri in the Menu bar and ask “Open Dashboard”, or something similar.
If you have set Dashboard as a space, use a Trackpad to access. Simply swipe right with three fingers.
In Mission Control Preferences, set a Mouse or keyboard shortcut; then use that to access Dashboard.
Now you can use any of the widgets you need, and add any as needed using the Add button ‘+’ in the lower-left corner of the screen. Remove them using the ‘-‘ minus symbol.
How to use Dashboard as a web monitor
- Go to the website(s) you want to monitor. Choose File > Open in Dashboard.
- The page or website will grey out, opening a purple border around part of the page you want to monitor.
- Now you can adjust the size of the border around the web source.
- Tap ‘Add’ and it will take you to the Dashboard with the source website pulling the information through to your Mac, making a shortcut to a specific website for quicker monitoring.
How to close Dashboard on Mac
When you want to close dashboard, either click anywhere on the screen and the widgets will fade, or press the escape key, or use the mouse, trackpad or keyboard shortcut to close.
Mac Dashboard Replacement
Dashboard is also incredibly useful for monitoring website you want to keep an eye on. Whether this is the status of a delivery or recent Amazon order, or a news outlet you read often.
Monitor your Mac with CleanMyMac X
There are always things that would be really useful if you could keep an eye on that don't come in a widget format. Such as your network connection speed and health status of vital functions (disk space, battery, etc.) For those, CleanMyMac X comes with a Menu monitoring feature.
Show Dashboard On Mac
The CleanMyMac X Menu comes with the ability to monitor RAM and how full your trash is, so if you experience a performance drop it can quickly isolate and clean the problem. The Menu even shows real-time statuses and health indicators of your hard drive, memory, battery, and CPU. You can also connect your Dropbox to see how much space is remaining. Plus it monitors several other vital functions, keeping your Mac running smoother straight from your status bar.
Download CleanMyMac X (for free).Everyday, CleanMyMac cleans 614TB of data for Mac users, and we have customers scanning and cleaning their Macs in 185 countries. CleanMyMac X comes with dozens of useful and smart features — a powerful app that your Mac needs.