Feb 18
Anyone experiencing full functioning widgets in Finder (Dashboard not activated!)? I do. One day was using widgets and repositioning them and suddenly found one shifted to the Finder and has there been ever since – more followed. And they’re fully functioning.
How did I do it? Don’t know, simply clicked on it, held mouse down and moved them. Can’t get rid of them now because even eliminating them from Dashboard still keeps them in the Finder (OS 10.5.1). Had to drag them to the bottom of the screen out of sight. Has anyone any suggestions or explanation. Even Apple Support can’t seem to help.
February 18th, 2008 at 7:14 am
http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20050422172929402
February 18th, 2008 at 9:06 am
you click on the widget and drag it and activate dashboard with your keyboard (whichever key it is) without letting go of the widget… it should go beck into dashboard…
the terminal command to stop this function it
defaults write com.apple.dashboard devmode NO
then killall Dock
to activate it again just type YES instead of NO then killall Dock
February 18th, 2008 at 11:24 am
You could just use OnyX and not have to write a foreign language into the terminal.
February 18th, 2008 at 11:31 am
As MacGeek said, this is a feature designed for widget developers. It’s very useful when you’re creating your own widgets or when you’d like to use a widget all the time (like a streaming radio controller widget), but pretty annoying when you don’t need it.
Read more:
http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20050422172929402
February 18th, 2008 at 12:44 pm
I wrote a script to turn the abillity on and off (in csh because I’m an old fogey), which looks like this:
#!/bin/csh
ask:
echo -n “Enter YES or NO to turn free widgets on or off > ”
set BOOGAH=$<
if ( $BOOGAH != “YES” && $BOOGAH != “NO” ) goto ask
defaults write com.apple.dashboard devmode $BOOGAH
killall Dock
This saves logging out when enabling or disabling the feature. Anyway, just sharing.
February 18th, 2008 at 2:12 pm
i kinda think thats they want this to happen…. to be able to use the widgets with full use anywhere now… i think im also wrong kinda so i really dono
February 18th, 2008 at 5:03 pm
You activated developer mode of dashboard
February 18th, 2008 at 5:28 pm
Thank you all. That procedure certainly did the trick and now know that it is a little publicized feature… Wonder though why Apply Support line (in Australia) didn’t think of it?…
February 18th, 2008 at 7:07 pm
Bug, nice script, love scripting, I must be an old fogey too! heh
iqbe, Apple Support unfortunately aren’t a bunch of elite hackers… hehe
February 19th, 2008 at 1:15 am
I am a widget developer it accidentally got put into developer mode. To get the widget off the desktop
Simply put your mouse over the widget and press and hold alt (option). And press the X in the top left.
Jack
-Gregory Online Services
Widget Developer
February 19th, 2008 at 6:51 am
the thing with it on your desktop is that the easy way u can take it off is if you hold the widget like your moving it and then activate your widget screen and then drop it and its back in your widgets
February 19th, 2008 at 11:12 pm
Widgets ON Desktop
To keep one or more widgets on the desktop in a more permanent fashion, the Dashboard “devmode” must be activated. Enter the following into the Terminal, “or Terminal.app” (/Applications/Utilities/Terminal.app):
defaults write com.apple.dashboard devmode YES
and then restart the Dock (and Dashboard):
“killall Dock”
After the devmode has been set, widgets dragged from the Dashboard will remain floating on the desktop, even after log out or shutdown. To move a desktop widget back to the Dashboard, simply reverse the process used to move it onto the desktop
February 20th, 2008 at 1:52 am
You don’t need any scripting or commands. Just hold down the alt/option key, and you’ll see an x in the corner of the widget. Simply click on the x, and the widget will disappear. The same shortcut works for getting rid of widgets in dashboard.
February 20th, 2008 at 1:52 am
my bad…I missed the earlier comment by Jack
Apologies.
February 20th, 2008 at 6:51 am
I have had this problem a few times. I disable the widget and it disappears from the desktop then I enable it again. That seems to work.
February 28th, 2008 at 2:45 pm
Cool, I got the widget to stay on the desktop enabling the developer mode.
Now… Is there any way to keep it on the desktop itself so that it doesn’t hover above the active windows?
March 1st, 2008 at 12:01 am
Jack….you’re a genius…thank you…how simple
June 15th, 2008 at 3:30 am
if you simply open up the widget manager widget you can get rid of any unwanted widgets in dashboard and the desktop
June 27th, 2008 at 1:52 am
Another way to do it… Download DashIt. It lets you move widgets from the dashboard to the desktop. Turn DashIt on, then click and hold the widget you want to move. Drag it a little, then keep holding and hit the dashboard hotkey. (You have to drag the widget at least a tiny bit to make it work.)
June 27th, 2008 at 7:02 am
Thanks Alex. So much blablabla that doesn’t work at all, but your tip is perfec. Now I can watch this France24 TV widget and work at the same time.
Cool!
July 21st, 2008 at 12:21 pm
click the dashboard button, click and hold on a widget, press the dashboard button again. bam your widget is everywhere;;; (download cocktail & enable developer mode 1st)
December 10th, 2008 at 3:04 pm
Jack:
thank you so much for that post. it worked perfectly.
just to restate what he said:
Simply put your mouse over the widget and press and hold alt (option). And press the X in the top left.
WORKS!!!!
January 10th, 2009 at 3:14 pm
How can you disable the floating window effect that the widget has? I do not want it to be over my other applications.
Thanks in advance.