Widgets

A widget is a visual element of a Web page, such as a button, entry field, or drop-down list. Your Macbook aleady has some widgets installed on it. If you click on the //Dashboard// some of your widgets will automatically appear. Some examples are the calculator, dictionary icon, and sticky note. If you would like to see all of your widgets, click on the **+** sign in the lower left hand corner. You will now be able to scroll through all of your available widgets. Pressing the F12 key will also show you all of your open widgets (press F12 again to close out of your widgets).

You may have noticed the Science News widgets on the Wiki home page. It is easy to add a widget to your webpage or wiki. Go to http://www.widgetbox.com/ You can search for a particular widget that you are interested in. To see a link of science widgits, click [|here]. Now, let's say that you want to add a widget for the Discovery Channel. You will find the link for the discovery channel widgit [|here.] Choose the color for your border and then choose "//Get Widgit//". Next select "//Get Widgit Code"// and copy the flash embed code. Finally, you will see a link at the top of the wiki that says //"insert widgit//" (it looks like a TV). Click on this and select "other //HTML//". Make sure that your cursor is at the location on your page where you want the widgit to appear. Then copy and paste the code. A grey box will appar that says custom. Click "save" in the upper right hand corner of the screen. Once refreshed, your widget should appear! I have created a blank page on the wiki to test various things. It is located here. Enjoy! media type="custom" key="334299"

There are some fun and educational widgets that can be downloaded from Apple's site. Here is the [|main link] for Apple's Dasboard Widgets.

Please click [|here] to view all of Apple's science widgits. The sky is the limit! Here are some widgits that I think might be particularly useful in the classroom.

[|3-2-1 Timer] Displays hours, minutes, and seconds, includes a lap function and is resizable. You can label each countdown (useful if you run more than one at a time), enter your own messages (to appear when a countdown has finished) and choose any sound to play.

[|Onscreen DNA Lite] Gives everyone a “painless” way to grasp the details of the double helix structure of DNA. This is accomplished by on-screen tutorials that guide you through an exploration of a virtual 3D model. In addition there is a simulation of DNA denaturation.

[|MeVisLab 1.5.2] eVisLab is a visual programming and rapid prototyping platform for medical image processing research and development

[|Atomic Mac 6.8] Full featured periodic table of the elements with detailed physical and nuclear information.

[|BALLView 1.2] Standalone molecular modeling and visualization application. It is also a framework for developing molecular visualization functionality.

[|Physics 101 SE 7.0.1] Physics homework and studying tool for students or teachers.

[|Graph Paper Maker 1.7.0] Create custom sheets of graph paper.

[|Equinox 6 6.5.2] A powerful astronomy program has many features for both the beginner and advanced astronomer