Filed under: Macintosh, Apple, Freeware, Mobile Minute
DashSaver makes your Mac's Dashboard into a screensaver
by Jason Clarke Jul 15th 2009
The Dashboard on my Mac perplexes me. While it feels like it should be a great productivity tool, the truth is that I rarely think to open it. I have widgets for everything from weather to my calendar and todos, and even financial information. And yet, if I never look at them, what good are they?
I started wondering if anyone else thought that Dashboard widgets would make a good screen saver, since that would ensure that they would be staring me in the face when I came back to my computer. And as it turns out, Andrew Turner thought so, as he developed a Mac screen saver called DashSaver for just this purpose.
DashSaver installs as a screen saver, and simply launches your Dashboard when the normal time has elapsed and your regular screen saver would show. There are no frills whatsoever in this tiny download. But beware - if you regularly lock your computer, DashSaver may not be for you. As per the release notes, it can't show the dashboard until the computer is unlocked, effectively leaving you without a screen saver showing.
It's worth noting that no changes have been made to DashSaver since April of 2006, so this program hasn't been updated since OS X Tiger. In my testing, however, it works just fine under Leopard.
Obviously, if you have sensitive or personal information on your Dashboard and your computer is not always in complete privacy, DashSaver probably isn't for you. But if you are looking for a way to keep those Dashboard widgets more top-of-mind, it might be worth a try. DashSaver is a free Mac download.
This is a tip that is probably only going to appeal to a small subset of Mac users, but those of you that have been looking for a way to do this are going to love it. The Mac's Dashboard widget environment does not run on your desktop full-time, but rather must be invoked with a keystroke, typically the F12 key. Other widget engines like 
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