If you're running Windows Vista, you've probably already played around with the stock sidebar gadgets that come installed on Vista. If you're interested in finding more sidebar gadgets, check out Windows Live Gallery to browse through what's available.

Probably the first thing I thought of when I became aware that the sidebar would be included in Vista was the idea that Outlook data could be kept on-screen to act as a sort of dashboard for your personal information like tasks and appointments, not to mention email.

Well so far there are three Outlook-related sidebar gadgets available: the general purpose Outlook info gadget, and the self-explanatory Outlook Upcoming Appointments and Outlook Tasks gadgets. All work basically as you'd expect.