Top 10 Best Miscellaneous Widgets for Windows PCs
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World Population Monitor
Displays population count of the world in a small gadget on your desktop, extracting information from official sources and updating the data periodically.
World Population Monitor is a small software utility that displays information about the global population. This application comes in handy for all users who want to animate their desktop activity by adding a new Windows gadget, or simply want to stay informed about the world’s population.
Provides info based on a trustworthy source
The program is able to render accurate information, and the data is provided by the Census.gov website statistics. World Population Monitor was designed with a single goal in mind, to display the estimated population number. Hence, it doesn’t provide other useful information, such as statistics for each country’s population.
Basically, it’s extremely easy to work with this gadget, since there aren’t many configuration settings. This could be only good news for all users who want to view information about the world’s population without having to go through special tutorials, or check a help menu.
Adjust the position and visual elements
You can resize the window’s application, and make the application automatically update its information, provided that you have specified the time interval (seconds, minutes, or hours).
Moreover, it is possible to change the color for the background, title, legend, population, date and time, error message, version and copyright. If you are not happy with the adjustments applied, you can always go back to the default colors.
A few last words
To sum up, World Population Monitor proves to be a handy Windows gadget that displays information about the world’s population. You don’t need special computer skills to work with this tool, and it’s also light on your system resources.
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COVID-19 Vaccine Tracker
A highly intuitive and user-friendly solution that displays details the progress of the COVID-19 vaccination all around the world.
COVID-19 is a pandemic that has spread like wildfire all around the world, so when vaccines started being distributed, authorities everywhere rushed to distribute them to the population.
And if you want to track the way vaccines have been administered worldwide, you can try COVID-19 Vaccine Tracker.
First install the sidebar
Depending on your operating system, the once popular Windows Sidebar might no longer be integrated. In this case, you first need to install Windows Desktop Gadgets to restore this sidebar to your PC.
Once this step has been completed, you can proceed with installing COVID-19 Vaccine Tracker and start examining the data it provides.
Browse constantly updated data
By default, the main window of the gadget shows you the total number of vaccine doses that have been administered globally. You can narrow it down so as to display only statistics related to the US or you can choose your home country and have its data presented within the main window alongside the world details.
When you want to get a closer look over the total number of people who received one or two vaccine doses, you can access the flyout window and analyze details about each country (if there are records made public). You can even perform a search to quickly locate a certain location and its corresponding statistics.
Customize the GUI colors
COVID-19 Vaccine Tracker offers you the possibility to personalize the colors used within its main window, then one where you get an overview of the current vaccination campaign. You can select one of the available colors or you can enter the color code you prefer in the dedicated field.
This way, you can modify not only the color of the text, but also the background and the appearance of the flyout window.
Conclusion
To wrap it up, COVID-19 Vaccine Tracker can help you monitor the progress of the COVID-19 vaccination in your own country, but also on a global scale.
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Barcode
Check the status and originating country of any EAN-13 barcode by providing corresponding digits with a barcode picture preview generated.
Just like every individual has its own set of identification details, so does every commercial product. It’s usually found in the form of a barcode, which contain necessary machine-readable characters to identify a product, vendor, and price. You can easily read such types of IDs with the help of Barcode.
Check status and country of EAN-13 barcodes
For starters, you need to know that Barcode is a Windows Gadget. This means that you have native support for it only if you’re using Windows 7. On the bright side of things, you can install host applications like 8GadgetsPack or Thoosje Sidebar for seamless integration of this particular gadget.
The name of the gadget is pretty suggestive, in the sense that it makes you believe it has something to do with barcodes. It does, and is in fact a method of reading a barcode, more or less. The desktop window is fitted with an input section for the values of interest, as well as a preview section for the actual barcode.
Read barcode through input of digits
What the gadget does is attempt to recognize the status and originating country of an EAN-13 barcode. This is done by manually providing the barcode values in the input field, summing up a total of 13 digits. The corresponding barcode is built on the spot, and it would have been useful to see a method to save, or at least be able to copy the barcode preview.
In terms of customization, it benefits from all the default settings of a gadget, such as the possibility to adjust opacity level, or make it stay on top of every other window. It also has a set of custom options, which bundle a couple of background pictures, and whether or not to display the barcode picture.
In conclusion
Taking everything into consideration, we can state that Barcode is a lightweight tool which lets you check the status and country of a barcode. However, it can only read EAN-13 codes, but only through input of the digits instead of the barcode picture, which is generated without an option to save.
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GCalculator
Add a simple, straightforward calculator to your gadget collection to perform easy math operations in case the Windows Calculator is too much.
Windows comes with all sorts of tools, some that help you work on ambitious projects, while other simply providing a bit of comfort or accuracy. One component in particular lets you place various utilities on your desktop, known as gadgets. You can download more from the web, with GCalculator being a suitable example.
Straightforward and easy to use
Since it’s a small gadget, it doesn’t really need to be installed, being integrated into your system from the first launch. As such, you can keep it stored along with your other gadgets on a USB flash drive to better organize your collection, especially since they take only little space.
Upon launch, a compact calculator shows up, and as you’re used to it, there’s the possibility to drag it anywhere on the desktop, for more comfort. There’s only one size specification, with little to no customization options other than the default option to make it transparent, trait you can apply to any other gadget, as a matter of fact.
Leaves more to be desired
Truth be told, the visual design leaves more to be desired, with a plain color covering the backgrounds, while buttons and other elements are poorly-detailed. There aren’t even any extra sets of colors or skins to make it blend with your desktop.
Functionality isn’t an advantage either, and you’re only able to perform simple operations with GCalculator, given there aren’t any complex functions, let alone a scientific counterpart. You’re free to use the keyboard for input, but this can only be done if you select the input field, otherwise it’s done in vain. Luckily, the result can be copied from the text field so you can insert it where needed.
A few last words
Taking everything into consideration, we can say that GCalculator is a lightweight gadget that helps you perform simple math operations. It might come in handy for calculus of large numbers, for bills and other budget related stuff, but it’s better to look for alternatives for scientific approach on calculus or advanced operations.
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ELEMENTS OF NATURE HD EDITION
View detailed weather forecasts, keep an eye on the RAM memory and the CPU usage, and view locally or online stored desktop backgrounds.
Desktop widgets provide you with an fun and interactive way of performing various tasks or find out general information. ELEMENTS OF NATURE HD Edition presents itself as a flexible desktop widget that not only deals with weather analysis and retrieval, but can change your background image depending on the weather.
The application optimally runs when you have a stable Internet connection, as well as Java installed and running on your computer.
Innovative weather widget with modern interface
The program provides you with an elegant and efficient way of finding out information about the weather, by retrieving data such as temperature, wind speed, humidity, sunset and sunrise hours, relative visibility and atmospheric pressure.
All this information can be quickly retrieved for various parts of the world, given that you can search for a famous city or region. The widget will display relevant results about your search, them retrieve data about the weather in that region.
Interactive weather tool that changes your background image
ELEMENTS OF NATURE HD Edition can be set to change your desktop background image to one that matches the weather displayed. By doing so, it sets a certain mood for you, reflected by the weather conditions outside.
Furthermore, the application can report weather conditions using a virtual presenter, that can be set to speak about various weather reports. By doing so, you can work without having to check the widget every time you want to find out about the weather, as the program will present it whenever changes occur.
A powerful and highly potent weather widget
To sum it up, ELEMENTS OF NATURE HD Edition is ideal for finding out information about the weather across the world, all provided through an interactive widget, that can automatically change your desktop background so that it matches the weather conditions retrieved.
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Alexa Monitor
Display the Alexa rank of the website of your choice by just typing it in the designated field of this lightweight, user-friendly widget.
If you want to keep track of your website's standing among other internauts, there are a few tools that could help you by providing you with the desired information.
One of the specialized applications that can help you in the situation depicted above is Alexa Monitor, a lightweight widget that displays your Alexa ranking directly on your desktop, without any other distractions.
Lightweight Alexa ranking widget
This tiny piece of software can help you keep track of your Alexa ranking by constantly displaying it on your desktop in a non-intrusive manner, without opening any additional windows or menus.
The information is displayed in the widget's main screen, which takes a small portion of your screen and is visible directly on your desktop. There is a field where you are prompted to type the website you want to see the ranking for.
Simplistic interface
Due to it being a widget, there is not too much to its interface. Since the application's purpose is simply to display the Alexa ranking of the website you chose, you cannot view additional statistics or other insight.
After you type the desired website in the designated field, the widget fetches the corresponding data automatically and displays it beneath the text box.
Rudimentary configuration menu
Alexa Monitor also provides you with a rudimentary configuration window, where you can adjust the size of the widget by typing a percentage value in the corresponding box.
It is also possible to enable notifications whenever a new version is available and perform a check for updated versions by clicking the dedicated button. Accessing this configuration window can be done by hovering the mouse pointer over the widget and clicking the wrench icon.
Lightweight app that displays the Alexa ranking of a given website
All things considered, if you need a quick way to keep track of your website's Alexa ranking, you can turn to Alexa Monitor, as it can provide you with the information you seek in an easy manner.
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BOINC Monitor
Monitor the progress of your BOINC tasks with the help of this lightweight, reliable and easy-to-use sidebar gadget with fully customizable appearance.
BOINC Monitor is a small gadget that displays the BOINC tasks progress right on your desktop.
Requies appropriate privileges to function
It comes packed with several customization preferences that can be seamlessly figured out by all user levels.
The interface is based on a very small frame that you can move to any position on the screen, with the help of the mouse cursor.
Once the file path to the BOINC application is specified, you can view all tasks and their progress bars, sorted in the order of completion.
Set notifications, calculation methods, and display colors
As far as configuration is concerned, you can set the app to automatically scale the DPI, enable update notifications, select the calculation method between standard and advanced mode, show active WUs only, disable sounds when the flyout opens or closes, as well as customize the colors for the background and text, and so on. Settings can be restored to their factory values with the click of a button.
As expected, BOINC Monitor has minimal impact on computer performance, using low CPU and RAM. It has a good refresh rate and displays accurate information. We have not come across any issues throughout our evaluation, since the tool did not hang, crash or pop up error dialogs.
A few last words
All in all, BOINC Monitor comes in handy to all users who want to get an overview of their BOINC tasks progress right on their desktop.
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MSTech Swift Gadget
Access some of your favorite apps, folders, libraries and other similar data by turning to this handy app that packs a simple interface.
If you own a Windows computer, you probably understand that sometimes your PC doesn't provide you with the quickest path to many of your contents, whether it's files, folders or even applications we're talking about.
However, nowadays there's a wide range of software solutions dedicated to helping you in this kind of situation by providing you with quick, convenient access to many contents on your PC. One of them is MSTech Swift Gadget.
Right-click access
After you deploy the application on your computer, you might be a little confused by the lack of desktop, Start Menu or Quick Access shortcuts, as there's apparently no way to access the program.
However, right-clicking anywhere on your desktop (files included), you'll notice an additional menu than the ones you've had up until that point. This menu is the way you can access the program and its features alike.
Brings you closer to your data
In order to make the most of MSTech Swift Gadget, you need to configure a series of basic parameters by accessing the "Settings" window and navigating to the corresponding sections.
You can set libraries with paths and descriptions for easy access and also create shortcuts for applications, folders and files on your computer by selecting the subsequent categories and specifying the parameters by typing them into the designated fields.
Additional functions
As you can see in the right-click access menu, you'll also be able to create new folders, open content in the MSTech NotePad application, which is an alternative to Windows' native "Sticky Notes" app, paste content as new text or image files and perform searches. Additionally, you can split and join files, pack and unpack them, batch rename files, calculate checksums, resize files and much more.
More so, you're given access to a bunch of Windows tools and classifying images by image size and date, ordering files by extension, sorting audio files and creating advanced playlists are also possible actions.
Handy file organizer and quick access app
All in all, if you're looking for a tool that can give you a quicker way to both access content on your computer and process it, MSTech Swift Gadget is an excellent option. It is easily accessible from the context menu, and it can be customized extensively.
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COVID-19 Monitor
Displays live statistics and coronavirus news tracking the number of confirmed cases, recovered patients, and death toll by country due to the COVID-19 virus.
Coronavirus disease has been declared by the World Health Organization to be a pandemic following the numerous people currently affected. If you also live in one of the affected countries or you just want to be informed regarding its outbreak, you can install COVID-19 Monitor.
Install the sidebar gadget
In order to access the data provided by this tool, you need to make sure you can install sidebar gadgets on your PC. If you are running Windows 8, 8.1 or 10, chances are that you first need to install Windows Desktop Gadgets or a similar solution.
Once this step has been completed, you only need to double-click the setup file of COVID-19 Monitor and you are good to go.
Track coronavirus statistics
The default window of the gadget displays information related to COVID-19 at a global scale, namely the number of detected cases, the current number of deaths and of all the recovered people.
You can go one step further and view details by country in a dedicated flyout window. Due to the integrated search function, you can easily find a certain country and analyze the corresponding values more carefully. Also, you can get a clear picture of the gravity of the situation globally since you can easily sort this data by the total number of detected cases.
To wrap it up
COVID-19 Monitor is meant to help you keep an eye on the evolution of this disease in all the affected countries, while also getting the chance to customize the default colors to your liking (you can easily restore the default settings if you are not satisfied with the outcome).
Furthermore, you can set it to update the information whenever you want, with a single mouse click, without needing to wait until the default 30-minute refreshing interval is up.
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Weather Monitor
Get a glimpse at the weather condition in any city in the world with this gadget, which displays the temperature, the pressure, the visibility and the wind speed.
Weather Monitor is a lightweight and non-obtrusive program that can help you see the current and future weather conditions in your city.
Gain access to a large deal of weather info
The program’s interface resembles many of the Windows Widgets in their simplicity, which means that any type of person is going to be able to use it, no matter their previous experience with the IT world.
The main window of the gadget enables you to access a lot of information regarding the weather. Aside from the temperature, you can view the atmospheric pressure, air humidity, visibility (expressed in km), UV index, wind and precipitation. In addition to that, the exact sunrise and sunset hours, and the lunar phase are featured in the application.
Adjust sources, refresh rate, and tweak aesthetics
The main screen also presents a small button that enables you to open the weather forecast for the following four days.
The settings panel is quite extensive and enables you to change the city corresponding to received data. From here you can also control the refresh rate (default is 30 minutes) and all the measurement units in which the temperature, pressure, wind speed and visibility are expressed.
The interface is also highly customizable, seeing that you can change the icons used in the gadget, along with all the different colors present. Moreover, you can hide or show any piece of information.
Right clicking on the software utility brings up the context menu whose entries you can find in most Windows Gadgets, which lets individuals move or close it, place it on top of any other apps, and change the opacity of the UI from 20% to up to 100%.
To sum it up
Weather Monitor is a lightweight, helpful widget from Accuweather that enables any type of user to view the current forecast, including information such as pressure, humidity, wind speed and the list goes on.
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