Beginning Mac OS X Tiger Dashboard Widget Development

  • Aimed at the estimated 300,000 Mac OS X developers who are interested in customizing and creating widgets for their Dashboards, this timely book shows them how to tap into the power of Mac OS X Tiger to create and customize Dashboard widgets
  • The expert author uses program examples and exercises to illustrate the different ways to customize the Dashboard through widget development using simple authoring tools, Internet plug-ins, and text editors
  • Begins with a discussion of the Dashboard concept and configuration and progresses to coverage of advanced functionality
  • Covers tools, protecting code, configuration, properties, bundles, resources, extensions, and much more

Biography

Fred Terry has been involved in the computer industry since making a left-hand turn into it from Ph.D. work in medieval languages and literature. He has written a number of software manuals and articles and has worked as a systems and network administrator, web developer, programmer, and quality assurance engineer. In addition to his ongoing love affairs with AppleScript and Perl, his current programming infatuations are Ruby and Ajax. Currently, Fred is a project manager for the Information Management Group at Burns & McDonnell. He has a B.A. in English from Southwestern Oklahoma State University and an M.A. in English from Oklahoma State University. He lives in Lawrence, Kansas, with his family and dog. Fred can be contacted at pfterry@deadtrees.net.

Table of Contents

Introduction.

Part I: An Introduction to Widgets.

Chapter 1: Tiger, Dashboard, and Widgets.

Chapter 2: The Basics of Widgetry.

Chapter 3: Widget Development Environment.

Chapter 4: Creating a Widget.

Chapter 5: Debugging and Testing.

Part II: Providing User Interaction.

Chapter 6: Giving a Widget Preferences.

Chapter 7: Widget Events.

Chapter 8: Adding to the Widget Interface.

Chapter 9: Adding Cut, Copy, and Paste to Your Widget.

Chapter 10: Adding Drag and Drop to the Widget.

Chapter 11: Access Keys.

Chapter 12: Using Plugins and Applets.

Part III: Example Widgets.

Chapter 13: Easy Envelopes.

Chapter 14: SecureCopy Widget.

Chapter 15: Amazon Album Art.

Chapter 16: Timbuktu Quick Connect.

Chapter 17: iPhoto Mini.

Chapter 19: More Widgets.

Appendix A: Answers to Exercises.

Appendix B: Additional Dashboard Programming Information.

Appendix C: Widget Distribution.

Index.

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