I've found the pre-installed weather widget loads quite quickly, ie. the one which if you click on 'i' for information is powered by The Weather Channel and Yahoo!
If you bring up your Dashboard, you should see a black and white '+' symbol in the bottom left corner of your screen, ie. a white '+' on a black circular background. If you click on the '+' symbol, a row of optional widgets should slide open, each of which you can drag to the Dashboard as many times as you like (the more copies you drag onto your dashboard, the more slowly the Dashboard widgets load overall). If you don't see an icon for Unit Converter, you need to look at the bottom right corner of your screen, after you've clicked on the '+' symbol, and click on the right-pointing arrow. This should take you to the next suite of widgets available. If you still don't see Unit Converter, keep scrolling through your available widgets by clicking the right arrow again. You can scroll back by clicking the left arrow at the bottom left of your screen, near where the '+' symbol was which will have now turned into an 'x'. If for some reason Unit Converter isn't there, I presume you can find and install it via ... http://www.apple.com/downloads/dashboard Cheers, Steven On 12/09/2010, at 1:41 PM, Laura Webb wrote: > > Hi Steven > > Thank you. Yes you are no doubt correct in suggesting I delete some widgets. > First to go will be the weather widget which does indeed take a long time to > load. > > How do I find the Unit Converter to use with Calculator? I tried searching > with Spotlight but all that comes up is today's emails to the List. > > Regards > Laura > > > On 12/09/2010, at 3:25 PM, Steven Knowles wrote: > > > I've found slow loading can be a problem if you have too many widgets on > display than you need. Great that you can have any number of clocks showing > different times around the world, or any number of Unit Converters so as not > to have to change settings each time, but if you go overboard with the number > of widgets which rely on the internet to pull data, dashboard loading can > slow to a crawl. > > I imagine a data hungry widget or two would have the same effect. For > instance, I had a widget from the Bureau of Meteorology. I noticed it always > took a while longer than the others to load. So I deleted it, and the whole > dashboard loading process increased in speed substantially. > > The preinstalled Calculator and Unit Converter widget combination are hard to > beat for convenience, although the Calculator has only basic functionality. > No doubt there's a fancier calculator widget out there though. > > Cheers, Steven > > > On 12/09/2010, at 4:28 AM, Laura Webb wrote: > >> >> Thanks Steven. >> >> I do have an Easy Currency Converter widget but Dashboard always seems slow >> to load meaning I have to wait for all the various items, clocks, weather >> etc to appear. I find Calculator in the dock a much better option for a >> quick currency conversion. >> >> Regards >> Laura >> >> >> On 12/09/2010, at 8:04 AM, Steven Knowles wrote: >> >> >> Laura, this doesn't answer your calculator problem, but using the Unit >> Converter widget alongside your calculator might be easier in the sense that >> exchange rates are accessed each inquiry, therefore no need to manually look >> up and amend exchange rates. >> >> The Unit Converter widget is amongst those which come preinstalled on your >> Mac. >> >> Cheers, Steven >> >> >> On 12/09/2010, at 3:19 AM, Laura Webb wrote: >> >>> >>> Good morning all >>> >>> A simple question and I'm sure there is a simple answer! >>> >>> I regularly use Calculator (4.5.3 in Scientific Mode) and when converting >>> currency always update the current exchange rate, Now for whatever reason >>> when I press "update" nothing happens. Not of major importance as I know >>> there are many other currency conversions available but I do like things to >>> work as they should!! >>> >>> Any suggestions would be appreciated. >>> >>> Regards >>> Laura -- The WA Macintosh User Group Mailing List -- Archives - <http://www.wamug.org.au/mailinglist/archives.shtml> Guidelines - <http://www.wamug.org.au/mailinglist/guidelines.shtml> Unsubscribe - <mailto:wamug-unsubscr...@wamug.org.au>
